Discovery House celebrates anniversary

CALAIS – The city’s methadone clinic was one year old Wednesday and the staff at Discovery House celebrated.

After more than a year of meetings and conferences, the privately owned clinic opened its doors last April.

The clinic began with 50 clients; today there are 207. It started with seven staffers; it now has 13. “The drug problem is still here and I don’t think it’s peaked,” said clinic director Carrie Perkins.

And 70 percent of the 200 addicts she has prescreened said their problem began with a doctor’s prescription. “They started out on Percocet and Vicodin and when OxyContin came out in 1997 and 1998, doctors were switching to that,” she said.

Clients have told her that had they known about the addictive nature of OxyContin, they never would have taken it. OxyContin is a high-powered pain medication usually prescribed for severe pain or during the final stages of cancer.

The synthetic narcotic methadone is used to treat people addicted to heroin or other opiates, including OxyContin, the abuse of which has plagued rural Maine, particularly Washington County.

The clinic is growing and clients come from all over, including New Brunswick, Canada. Preference is given to Washington County addicts. About 90 percent of the clients are from Down East.

Perkins said there was no problem with methadone clients entering the country. “They can get a waiver and they come right here and then they leave,” she said. Those clients are tracked by border patrol agents.

And it’s not a free ride. Perkins said that Canadians have to pay like everybody else, because Discovery House is a private company with no government funding.

The clinic recently underwent a state inspection and officials said Discovery House could increase its client base to 300. “[It’s] the fastest growing clinic they’ve ever had,” Perkins said of the clinic’s owners.

The Providence, R.I.-based company is also looking to open another clinic in the southern part of Washington County. The Calais clinic was the first outpatient methadone treatment clinic in Washington County. Maine has five other drug-abuse treatment programs – one each in South Portland, Winslow, Westbrook and two in Bangor.

Although most people believe that the majority of patients who frequent the clinic are in their early 20s, Perkins said that was a myth. Thirty-five percent of the clinic’s female clientele are between the ages of 25 and 34 years old, while another 23 percent are between the ages of 35 and 44 years. Only 19 percent are between the ages 21-24.

Among the male population – 47 percent are between the ages of 25-34; 31 percent are between the ages of 35-44; 21 percent are between the ages of 21-24.

Opening a methadone clinic Down East was not without heartburn for the company. People feared that it would lead to problems because the clinic is in a residential area. “We have not had any issues at all. People come and they leave. They have a life. This is not someplace they want to loiter or hang out,” she said. “We have a line at 6 in the morning, but people have jobs, they need to get to school or get their kids to school. They schedule their [two-hours of] counseling for some other time.”

Recently the company purchased the property at Beech Street and plans to expand and add more services. There also will be mental health counseling and an intensive outpatient program. “That’s for everybody. You don’t have to be 3a methadone patient. It’s a drug-free outpatient service,” she added.