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BENZODIAZEPINES: CO-OPERATION
NOT CONFRONTATION (BCNC)

WEBSITE

August 2005

After the official opening of Oldham's innovative tranquilliser addiction treatment service, which is funded by the Oldham Primary Care Trust, a group of voluntary support people who had been invited to the opening, held meetings of their own which resulted in the forming of a new Benzodiazepine support group.

The support group will be known as Benzodiazepines: Co-operation not Confrontation (BCNC). It will be primarily aimed at people who are affected by prescription supplied benzodiazepines although help will be given wherever it is needed.

The founding members of the group are: Barry and Sue Haslam who are both involved with Beat the Benzos and live in the Oldham area; Mike and Pauline Levins who assist in the running of a voluntary drug centre, again in the Oldham area; Allan and Thelma Weatherburn who have been carers for the last twenty years and live in the Barrow-in-Furness area of Cumbria; Gwen Bailey an ex-nurse and a user of benzodiazepines who is partaking in a withdrawal programme - she lives in the Bournemouth area; Alison Kellagher, a psychotherapist who lives in America and was addicted to benzodiazepines for 17 years before weaning herself off them some three and a half years ago.

The aims of the group are:

  1. To achieve a situation where no medical practitioner supplies a new patient with benzodiazepines or "Z" drugs (tranquillisers or sleeping pills), for a longer period of time than the two to four weeks that are recommended by the Committee on Safety of Medicines. This would ensure that no future patients should fall into the addiction trap through the issuing of prescriptions by their GP.

  2. To provide a support network for people who, unfortunately, are already addicted to prescribed benzodiazepines and "Z" drugs, for as long as they need support.

  3. To make full use of all of the existing knowledge, expertise and experience, and to identify and promote best practices wherever they exist thus ensuring that the standard of help and assistance is the same countrywide.

  4. To influence the prescribing and usage of benzodiazepines and "Z" drugs and to develop innovative ways of ensuring that the public at large has access to proper and comprehensive information about all aspects of these drugs before being prescribed them by their medical practitioner.

  5. To develop and promote a more compassionate understanding of withdrawal and the symptoms that are experienced by people who undertake withdrawal from these drugs. This would involve not only dosage reduction but also the time period between each set of reductions, both of which must be under the control of the patient.

  6. To challenge the medical confidentiality aspects associated with people using prescribed long term Benzodiazepines and "Z" drugs so that the people who help to look after them are more aware of the problems they are dealing with.

  7. To become a registered charity so that decisions can be made without the influence of any parties that might have a self-interest.

  8. To establish a national funding policy which supports people who are long-term users of prescribed Benzodiazepine and "Z" drugs.

How will we achieve these aims?

  1. To stop the prescribing of benzodiazepines / "Z" drugs for greater periods of time than those laid down by the Committee on Safety of Medicine it is likely to need legislation by the Government. The same applies if one was to consider having these drugs upgraded to category "A" drugs. To get action by the Government it will be necessary to put pressure on MPs and political parties and this can only be done by rasing public awareness if the problem. There are around 1.2 million people in this country who are on long term prescriptions of Benzodiazepines. If we assume that each of these has, on average, three close family members then we have a potential untapped source of 3.5 million people who could be mobilised to help fight our cause.

    2. To reach these people we need to be organised on a city/town basis in a similar manner to AA (Alcoholics Anonymous). We will have to recruit people who are prepared to help on both local and area levels. We need immediately people who are willing to join in the early stages and are prepared to cover the County in which they live. They would then help set up the organisation within that area and act as the point of contact for information which needs to be relayed back to a central core of people who would act as the Management Committee. Remember more hands make less work.

  2. We will make good use of the Internet for gathering and circulating of information such as best practices etc to both members of the organisation and to all areas of the NHS.

  3. We will make links with existing organisations that help people with symptoms such as anxiety disorders, panic disorders, irritable bowel, hiatus hernia, sleeplessness, obsessive compulsive disorder and agoraphobia. Many of the symptoms are similar to those caused by long term use of Benzodiazepines. Many of these groups are supporting people who are taking Benzodiazepines / "Z" drugs.

  4. We will have people interacting with all Primary Care Trusts and GPs' organisations with a view to overcoming this massive problem.

  5. If we can stop doctors prescribing these drugs for longer than the guidelines permit then we will create a situation where there won't be new long term users in the future and we can concentrate on the existing long term users suggesting why and how they can come off these drugs. We will give them understanding and support for as long as they need it. We will make every effort to ensure that the help available is not only from the voluntary sector but urge that a drug addiction centre should be available in all PCTs, and counselling available at all GPs' surgeries.

If you can help, and live in any of the following Counties: Cumbria, Northumberland, Durham, Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Suffolk, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Merseyside or Cheshire, then contact us by sending an email to: alan.weatherburn@tiscali.co.uk

If you can help, and live in any of the following counties: Cornwall, Devon, Dorset, Hampshire, Surrey, Kent, Sussex, Wiltshire, Shropshire or Herefordshire then send an email to: m.mbailey@btinternet.com

UK Information · Beat The Benzos Campaign

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