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‘Lights’ out at St. Joseph’s rehab
By Emily Hunkler, Adirondack Daily Enterprise Staff Writer
Printed: Adirondack Daily Enterprise July 24, 2008
SARANAC LAKE - While St. Joseph's Rehabilitation
Center has helped its residents deal with addictions to drugs
and alcohol since 1971, the vast majority of them have held tight
to one dependency: tobacco. Starting today, residents here and
at treatment centers across the state will be forced to kick the habit.
The transition, which applies to addiction treatment centers across the state, is a result of regulations from the
state Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services (OASAS).
OASAS is the licensing agency for addiction treatment centers in the state. New York is the first state to enact
tobacco-free regulations at all addiction treatment centers.
Suzanne Goolden, St. Joseph's inpatient services director, said it only makes sense to address nicotine addiction
along with other substance abuse.
"One of the things that drives the regulations is the risk of tobacco," Goolden said. "It is an addictive substance
and can be diagnosed in much the same way as cocaine and heroin dependence."
According to OASAS, the smoking rate in New York is now 18.2 percent; however, it is as high as 92 percent among
the 1.8 million New Yorkers who are dealing with alcoholism and drug addiction.
According to Goolden, of the more than 50 residents at St. Joseph's only eight of them are non-smokers. St. Joseph's
would not let its residents be interviewed citing confidentiality, but Goolden anticipates a tough transition for
some of them.
"Some of our residents have said that they are going to leave and some of them have already left, saying,
'It's a hard process, and now on top of it all, I can't smoke,'" Goolden said.
Residents at St. Joseph's are confined to the property for the majority of their stay, Goolden said, meaning that
opportunities to smoke are far and few between.
However, Goolden said they have been preparing for the transition for some time.
"We've known about this regulation for almost two years," Goolden said. "We have had help developing quit plans for
our clients and we are utilizing Chantix as a support to them to help make the transition to a tobacco-free lifestyle."
According to its Web site, Chantix is non-nicotine prescription medicine specifically developed to help adults to
quit smoking.
According to OASAS, treatment centers are aided in this effort by an $8 million grant from the state Department of
Health that goes toward funding free training services for staff and nicotine replacement therapies at no cost to the
patients who do not have insurance coverage for those materials.
Goolden said St. Joseph's has also been dwindling the number of smoke breaks in the schedule, and the on-site store
stopped selling cigarettes last week.
"It's not like we just turned off the switch; we have been planning for this," Goolden said. "We will see what
happens when the reality hits."
St. Joseph's inpatient facility is located at 159 Glenwood in Saranac Lake, while their outpatient treatment centers
are in Saranac Lake, Malone, Elizabethtown and Ticonderoga.
Contact Emily Hunkler at 891-2600 ext. 24 or
ehunkler@adirondackdailyenterprise.com.
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