Kroger interactively combats opioid abuse

A supermarket giant is offering a new digital resource to educate consumers about proper usage and handling of prescription drugs.

Kroger Health, the healthcare division of The Kroger Co., is launching a new interactive prescription drug safety course for adults. The retailer is offering the free wellness resource in collaboration with social-impact technology platform EVERFI. 

The mobile-friendly wellness resource uses interactive scenarios and self-guided activities to lead adult prescription drug users through 10 learning modules. The modules cover topics such as using safe disposal methods, recognizing and recovering from an opioid misuse situation, and supporting friends and family suffering from opioid misuse or opioid use disorder. The solution is designed to sift through large quantities of data to provide users with real-time access to relevant information.

Kroger is building on existing efforts with EVERFI to digitally educate high school students about prescription drug safety. In 2018, Kroger Health joined the EVERFI Prescription Drug Network, and has since digitally educated 43,000 high school students across the U.S. Walmart also collaborates with EVERFI in educating high school students and has created a virtual reality (VR) tool for training first responders to recognize and respond to an opioid overdose.

"At Kroger Health, our vision is to help people live healthier lives," said Colleen Lindholz, president of Kroger Health. "Providing this new prescription drug safety course for our associates and customers will help them better understand their prescription medication, techniques to properly dispose of that medication, and ways to help family and friends who may be struggling with a prescription misuse disorder.”