Spero Health and Cordant Health Solutions have teamed up to make the overdose-reversing drug naloxone, also known as Narcan, a normal part of medication-assisted treatment (MAT). The initiative is already showing promising results, the companies announced in a press release.

Headquartered in the Nashville area, Spero Health is one of the nation’s largest office-based opioid treatment providers (OTPs), with more than 45 clinics across Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Virginia and Tennessee. The company is privately held by Heritage Group, Health Velocity Capital, South Central, Inc. and Frist Cressey Ventures.

Meanwhile, Cordant provides solutions to behavioral health organizations. Providers can access monitoring and risk-assessment tools through Cordant’s drug testing options and pharmacies, which specialize in the management and dispensing of addiction treatment medications. The Denver-based company also offers analytic tools and serves the criminal justice and pain management markets.

Spero and Cordant have been working together for about eight months to provide MAT patients with naloxone. Specifically, Cordant has been providing access to the drug, along with MAT prescriptions, to Spero clinics in Kentucky and Tennessee.

The idea is to be realistic about recovery — which often comes with relapses — and to set patients up for success.

As part of the initiative, Spero clinicians candidly discuss risk prevention and recovery with patients, who then receive prescribed naloxone at the clinic through Cordant’s managed pharmacy program.

This summer alone, 486 patients at two of Spero’s treatment clinics in eastern Kentucky received naloxone at their addiction treatment appointment.

“Four of my patients have already used their initial prescription on a friend or loved one, so I regularly check to see who needs refills,” Byron Crider, a provider at Spero’s largest clinic in Kentucky, said in the press release. “Just as we keep a fire extinguisher in our homes should the unthinkable occur, MAT patients should carry naloxone to protect themselves and their loved ones.”

The goal is to help keep patients alive, even despite slip ups, as they work toward recovery.

“Many providers don’t focus on naloxone as part of addiction treatment, yet research shows that access to naloxone decreases overdose deaths,” Daniel Mandoli, Cordant’s president of pharmacy services, said in the press release. “Delivering naloxone to patients at their office visit through our onsite program ensures they receive it, which is an important step in the process.”