A Model to Save Lives Through a Volunteer First Responder Service Providing Antidote Treatment in Opioid Overdose

The accuracy of opioid overdose recognition among medical dispatchers is as of today an underexplored field. The risk of naloxone-responders being alerted to other medical emergencies than opioid overdoses is as a consequence unknown. The first aid course aims to improve the knowledge and emergency management of responders who get alerted to false positive opioid overdoses, while the naloxone and overdose in-depth education aims to help responders to properly identify and manage true overdoses. Naloxone reverses opioid effects temporally, which calls for prolonged medical assistance with observation and sometimes repeated doses of naloxone at the hospital. The integration of naloxone-responder alerts and emergency medical service dispatching when bystander call the national emergency number is therefore a model with both short- and long-term management of overdose conditions. The RESPONDER trial is a two-year pilot project with a one-year follow-up of each registered participant, so called naloxone-responder. At least four different follow-up sub-studies will be performed during and 1-2 years after the pilot period: 1. A quantitative study of feasibility, acceptability and safety of the intervention. 2. A quantitative study on mortality post-pilot as primary outcome, and clinical outcome after intervention compared to no intervention as secondary outcome. 3 and 4. Two qualitative studies exploring the experiences of: A. receiving naloxone from a naloxone-responder, from the overdose survivors' point of view, and B. accepting overdose alerts as a naloxone-responder, respectively.