Naloxone training near me expands as UT Health Sciences rolls out OneBox kits statewide

Sarah Mills | GlobalBeat

UT Health Science Center launched free weekly naloxone classes and mailed 2,000 overdose-reversal kits to rural Tennessee counties on Monday.

The Memphis-based campus added Thursday evening sessions after first classes filled within 48 hours, program director Dr. Andrea Gentry told reporters.

Tennessee recorded 3,380 fatal overdoses in 2024, up 9% from the previous year, according to state health data. The deaths pushed the five-year toll past 15,000. Rural counties posted the sharpest rises, with some approaching city-level mortality rates for the first time.

Gentry said the training push targets those ZIP codes. “We can ship a OneBox anywhere, but the person holding it still needs 15 minutes of coaching to use it right,” she said. The university streams the same curriculum on Facebook Live and archives recordings for on-demand viewing.

Each OneBox contains two 4 mg nasal naloxone sprays, vinyl gloves, a breathing mask, and pictorial instructions. Participants who complete the quiz receive a certificate and a second kit to give away. Shipping costs are covered by a $1.4 million federal grant awarded last September.

The grant also bankrolls a mobile unit scheduled to start touring West Tennessee county fairs in May. The retrofitted RV will park outside rodeos and gospel singings and offer walk-up lessons without registration, outreach coordinator Malik Johnson said. Johnson spent five years as a paramedic in Shelby County before joining the university. “I carried naloxone in my pocket every shift. Now we’re putting it in pockets that never see an ambulance,” he said.

State health commissioner Dr. Tim Thomason endorsed the effort in a brief email Tuesday. “Community distribution is the only way we outrun fentanyl,” Thomason wrote. He added that Tennessee has already distributed 450,000 naloxone doses since 2022 through county health departments, libraries, and now universities.

Local reaction has been mixed. Memphis harm-reduction group CodeineFree praised the initiative but warned that mailing kits cannot replace face-to-face outreach among people who actively use drugs. “Postage is great, but trust is better,” volunteer Marisol Paez said outside the university’s student union, where the first class drew 85 attendees.

Pharmacy chains are watching closely. CVS district manager Lawrence Odom said the company stocks naloxone over the counter statewide but still requires a $49 payment unless customers present insurance. “If universities give it away free, our sales will fall, but lives will be saved, and that’s fine with us,” Odom said by phone.

The OneBox concept originated at the University of Kentucky in 2021 and has since spread to Arkansas, West Virginia, and now Tennessee. Designers chose bright-orange plastic so the kit can be spotted inside a cluttered glove compartment. A QR code on the lid links to a 90-second refresher video readable on 3G networks.

Classes cover Tennessee’s “Good Samaritan” law, which shields lay responders from drug-possession charges if they call 911 while administering naloxone. Many trainees are unaware the protection exists, Gentry said. “They think police will arrest them for touching the needle. We show the exact statute on the screen.”

Registration data show 62% of sign-ups identify as family members of someone with opioid-use disorder. Nursing students account for another 20%. The remaining 18% include hairdressers, bartenders, and church deacons who want kits for their workplaces.

Johnson expects to train 5,000 residents by December and ship 10,000 OneBoxes by next spring. Demand is already outpacing projections. The university ordered an additional pallet of naloxone from pharmaceutical distributor Emergent Biosolutions on Tuesday, doubling its original purchase.

Background

Tennessee’s overdose curve began climbing in 2013 when prescriptions fell but heroin and later fentanyl filled the gap. Rural counties lacked treatment beds and syringe exchanges, so deaths lingered above the national average despite statewide prescribing limits. Naloxone was legalized for lay purchase in 2014, yet cost and stigma kept pharmacy uptake low.

Federal grants started flowing after the CDC labeled the region “Zone 1” for the highest fentanyl mortality. Universities became eligible distributors in 2022 when the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration expanded its harm-reduction grant track. UT Health Sciences applied the next cycle and received the maximum award for a first-time applicant.

What’s Next

Governor Bill Lee will tour the mobile unit in June and is expected to announce matching state funds for colleges in Nashville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga to replicate the program. If approved, those campuses could begin shipping their own OneBoxes this fall, blanketing Tennessee with a coordinated naloxone lattice before the winter holidays, when overdoses typically spike.

The long-term test is whether mailed kits reach people still using drugs or sit unused in kitchen drawers. Researchers at UT’s College of Pharmacy will track redemption of embedded coupons for free HIV and hepatitis-C screening to measure actual engagement. Early data from Kentucky show 42% coupon return, a figure Tennessee hopes to beat by pairing shipments with text-message check-ins from peer recovery coaches.