The RI Department of Corrections has a unique program called the Medication Assisted Treatment Program (MAT). This program is helping to reduce opioid overdoses by medically treating inmates while they’re in jail and assisting them in continuing the treatment when they’re released.
This program has been very successful which has caused other jails and prisons from around the country to reach out and see how the program works. These inquiries had gotten to such a large quantity that the leaders of the MAT program were inundated with these requests and couldn’t keep up with answering them and running the actual program.
One of their partners, Brown University reached out to us about creating a video to capture all of the information that gets repeated over and over again in these calls. Putting this information in a video would not only save everyone involved a ton of time, but it’d also standardize the information everyone was getting on the program.
We went to the RIDOC for a 3 day shoot conducting 30-40 minute interviews with each person involved in the program, from the Wardens, to security, to their partner. We worked through those interviews and put together a final piece which is about 90 minutes and gets all of the info across in a clear manner.
The section of the video above shows the MedLine. This is where the inmates actually get their medication and it explains how that process works. They were particularly excited about having this section on film as they got a lot of questions on how it actually works, and the visuals really help.
We get to work on a big variety of projects covering many industries and topics. One of my favorite parts of the job is all of the information we get to learn along the way. This project really showed me the real issue of the opioid crisis and how thinking differently and creating a program like this can make such a big difference on so many peoples lives.
RIDOC Director Patricia A. Coyne-Fague, Esq. said, “This video is a helpful tool for those who want to know more about our MAT program.” She continued, “The results are clear, the numbers speak for themselves. The program is working; it is saving lives.”
