ELLSWORTH — A new resource for those affected with substance use disorder has opened in Ellsworth. Kim Marshall, a board certified nurse practitioner and doctor of nursing practice, is the founder of Exline Health, a small clinic that specializes in helping those whose lives have been affected by drug addiction, particularly opioids, get clean and begin a new life.
“This is going to be focused on folks that have addictions mainly to heroin, which is mostly fentanyl these days,” Marshall said.
Marshall began the stages of opening her clinic last year, and recently moved to a permanent location at 5 School St. in Ellsworth, on the second floor of the building.
“I started out at a different location; it was just a small little office because I needed an address for all the insurance companies and all the credentialing that you have to go through,” Marshall said. “Then this became available, so I moved here. I think I came here in the spring, April.”
Marshall has a very specific focus at Exline Health, which is to combat the opioid epidemic.
“Maine, from January through October of this year has had almost 9,000 overdoses,” Marshall said. “There’s close to 600 of them that were fatal in this 10-month period, so that’s roughly 60 people a month in the state of Maine.”
Marshall wants to use different methods than other clinics that specialize in addiction treatment by taking an individualized approach to treat patients.
“It’s focused, individualized addiction medicine,” Marshall said. “There are some other places, they work on slightly different models, so I have the opportunity to make this individualized because every individual is different.”
Marshall does not use group work as many clinics do. Instead, she works to be available whenever her patients need her, striving to be as accessible as she can.
“I can see people, you know, based on availability of theirs and mine, seven days a week including holidays,” Marshall said. “It doesn’t have to be a strict Monday through Friday, 8-to-5 thing, and I think that probably will be beneficial.”
Marshall treats patients using the medication suboxone, which helps to reduce opioid cravings, while also lessening withdrawal symptoms that occur when a person stops using.
“It [heroin/fentanyl] completely hijacks a person’s brain, and it’s hard to get off of it because of the withdrawal symptoms,” Marshall said. “Suboxone kind of works on a receptor in the brain and it helps stop the cravings and it helps kind of balance out the withdrawal symptoms.”
Marshall said the withdrawal symptoms are often what stands in the way of an opioid addict getting clean. The symptoms are painful and wreak havoc on the body.
“They’re horrible and miserable from the nausea, the vomiting, the shakes, the sweating, feeling like they have bugs crawling all over them and all of that,” Marshall said of withdrawal symptoms.
Marshall said that before taking suboxone, a user will spend their entire day looking for opioids to avoid withdrawal. Once they start taking the medication, they can function normally without worrying about symptoms.
“A person on suboxone is absolutely perfectly functional,” Marshall saud. “They can drive, they can work, they can function, they can raise a family, they can because it doesn’t make you high.”
Exline Health also strives to be a resource for more than just physical health for patients. In addition to helping patients get clean and stop using illegal substances, Marshall works to help them turn their lives around.
“It’s much more than taking suboxone, though, it’s about now how do I repair my life and rebuild it? How do I do that?” Marshall said. “I really want to be a part of that also.”
This includes helping recovering addicts find employment.
“I hope to partner with some of the community like employers and help people get back on their feet and give jobs and find people willing to, you know, participate in that,” Marshall said. “It’s a lot of goal setting. It’s a lot of that kind of stuff. Get a job, land on their feet, start putting some money away and maybe get a place. Maybe pay off the people they owe and their creditors and maybe start having a life — that is a big deal.”
Marshall has been working in medicine for over 20 years, but only recently began her journey into treating those recovering from substance use.
“My background as a nurse practitioner has been in hospital medicine,” she said. “There is extra education that has to come with this [drug addiction recovery] in order to do this, so I’ve done that.”
Marshall’s inspiration comes from some friends of her sons, who struggled with opioid addiction and ultimately overdosed. Personally knowing people whose lives have been ruined by drugs has made the issue close to Marshall’s heart.
“A lot of their friends that they went to high school with are all dead, you know, we went to a couple of funerals. It was all overdose-related so that became compelling,” Marshall said. “It became compelling to see somebody’s mother or father go through that grief with something that could have been prevented.”
Marshall’s operation is small, but her mission is big, and each person she helps drives her to do more.
“If I have 100 patients, which is a lot of people, or one person, and you save one life out of that, that’s a big deal,” Marshall said.