A St. Petersburg mother has made it her life’s mission to lessen the number of overdose deaths in our country.
According to the CDC, over 100,000 persons died as a result of a drug overdose in 2022 alone.
Carolyn Bradfield founded the Interact Lifeline organization. Its original goal was to inform people about the hazards of fentanyl and opioids. It also tries to keep people involved in treatment after they leave rehab.
Bradfield founded the company after her daughter died of an overdose in 2017.
“Like many, many families over the past years, I had a personal tragedy in my family. My daughter overdosed and died at Christmas,” Bradfield said.
A tragedy that most mothers never recover from. Bradfield said she felt her daughter’s death was a call to action.
“Pretty soon after her death, I started researching why people were relapsing and overdosing at such a high rate,” Bradfield explained.
Bradfield then used her technological and business experience to launch Interact Lifeline. It’s a digital service that helps recovery programs and keeps people linked to treatment online after they leave rehab.
She is also working on an app that will be available next year. This will be able to detect a possible overdose.
“It’s designed to prevent overdoses and overdose deaths by extracting data from your fitness tracker,” Bradfield said.
The software links to your Apple Watch, Fitbit, or whatever fitness tracking device you use. It then monitors your vital signs and heart rate. A potential overdose can then be detected by the team.
“So the moment we see that happen, we reach out, we give you 30 seconds to respond to the ‘are you ok,’ but we’re also alerting your emergency contacts,” Bradfield added.
The app knows your specific location, allowing them to reach you as soon as possible. This, according to Bradfield, would have saved her daughter’s life.
“Now, my daughter, when she overdosed, she was a mile from the trauma hospital. She was around a lot of people; they did not intervene,” Bradfield explained.
She said she hopes this app can see lives and prevent other families from dealing with the devastation that her family went through.
She also encourages everyone to have Narcan in their medicine cabinet or even carry it in a purse. That can save someone’s life.
You can buy Narcan over the counter, or the locations below offer free Narcan.
- Specialty Care Center at 1105 E. Kennedy Blvd.
- University Area Health Center at 13601 N. 22nd St.
- Sulphur Springs Health Center at 8605 N. Mitchell Ave.
- Tuberculosis Center at 8515 N. Mitchell Ave.
Click here to request free Narcan to be delivered to your home.