As Joyce Anne Longfellow has learned first-hand, sometimes the most tragic events in life can be turned into something positive that can help other people avoid the same heartache.
Longfellow, a south Tempe resident, lost her granddaughter Phoenix Marie Dennis Voliva to an accidental drug overdose of prescription medications in June 2009. Voliva was just 28 years old and left behind a husband and five children.
Longfellow, who is one of the owners of Children’s Dental Village in Tempe, was heartbroken. In the ensuing days, as she was helping to care for Voliva’s children, one of them arrived at her home with a “baggie full of pills” that the child was supposed to take for a medical condition. Longfellow’s anguish became compounded by concern and fear.
With no bottles and no instructions to refer to, Longfellow felt uncomfortable administering the medicine to the child. When a visit to Voliva’s home showed her that all of her children, ages 6 to 12, were also taking strong prescription medications for conditions like bi-polar disorder, Longfellow realized that unless everyone was extremely careful, any of her great-grandchildren could die from an accidental overdose the same way her granddaughter did.
“I saw the pharmacy that they had in their home,” Longfellow said, adding that the kids were taking prescribed medications including sleeping pills, amphetamines and lithium.
Through speaking with medical professionals, friends and other people whose children are on medication for various behavioral and emotional health issues, Longfellow learned that many kids are taking prescription drugs.
“I thought to myself, ‘this is not right,’ so I spoke with a psychiatrist about it and learned that tests were probably not being run on young children to see if they are bi-polar, and so my goal became to get more answers, and to get people help.”
In an effort to support and educate families, teachers and physicians of children on medication for behavior and emotional issues, Longfellow organized an event called “Consider This: A Conversation About ‘The Medicated Child.’”
The free program will be from 5 to 9 p.m. Tuesday, May 17 at the Davidson Center at Grace Community Church, 1200 E. Southern Ave., Tempe.
From 5 to 6 p.m., Longfellow will show the Frontline/PBS documentary “The Medicated Child,” to help explain the issues at hand. Guests may watch the program online ahead of time if they are unable to arrive until later on in the program. This will be followed by participant networking and exhibits, an interactive panel discussion with a question-and-answer time, and then more networking and exhibits.
What the event will not be, Longfellow stressed, is a series of lectures designed to convince parents one way or the other about medications for their children.
“This will be an unbiased presentation,” she said. “Experts will not say whether or not to medicate kids. This will be about informing people and answering questions and helping people know which questions to ask, like what to say to the schools about medications and what to ask doctors.”
Voliva’s children are doing well, Longfellow said, and four of the five are no longer on prescription medication. As a grandmother who is still grieving, her only hope is that the presentation will help prevent another family from going through the same thing.
“It’s become a tribute to Phoenix and the kids she left behind,” she said. “It’s so some good can come from her death. What better thing to do than to turn this into something to help others? I can’t bring her back, but I can make sure that something good comes from this.”
To RSVP for the event, visit www.considerthismay17.eventbrite.com
To watch “The Medicated Child” online visit http://budurl.com/medicatedchild
