A lifelong Ohio resident who today works for American Addiction Centers and covers Montgomery County along with four other counties in Ohio, Burger-Holt graduated from Purdue University with a degree in child development and family studies.
“I have a lot of experience on the adolescent side,” she said. “I’ve done community outreach for the past 30 years.”
Burger-Holt started out her career as a probation office for Butler County and worked with Judge David Niehaus, who was known as an advocate for youth and believed in second chances. From there she moved into other opportunities working with youth to help them avoid the criminal system.
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“I worked with kids struggling with addiction,” Burger-Holt said. “And I helped them get clean and stay clean.”
She also helped develop a residential program with Cincinnati Children’s for youth with mental health problems and said she learned to understand these conditions and worked to eliminate the stigma of mental health among the general population. And while working at a crisis hotline in Butler County, Burger-Holt came to understand the almost epidemic levels of heroin and drug abuse among Ohio citizens today.
“I wanted to help people understand you can break a lot of mental health and addiction issues for good,” Burger-Holt said. “I had some amazing opportunities and they were definitely eye opening. I was fortunate to stumble upon American Addiction Centers (AAC) and haven’t looked back since.”
This was three years ago, and today Burger-Holt works as a treatment consultant for AAC and works mostly with adults ages 18 to 65. A national organization, headquartered in Brentwood, Tenn., AAC has developed a philosophy for care that includes five elements: medical detox, residential detox, residential treatment, partial hospitalization, and intensive outpatient programs.
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“I work on the phone and in person,” Burger-Holt said. “My referral sources come from hospitals and emergency rooms, clients seeking help themselves, their family members. I handle all the logistics on the front end.”
Burger-Holt works to develop individual treatment plans for each patient who comes to her. She works with insurance companies and looks over hospital records to determine the best process for each person.
“If they come to us for treatment, I also set up their aftercare, which could include intensive outpatient care and setting up counseling for them and their families,” Burger-Holt said. “I want to make sure they stay plugged in, because it’s almost like being a diabetic – you would never skip a day of your medication, and they shouldn’t skip a day of treatment.”
Burger-Holt said she averages around 10 calls per day and learns something new every day.
“When you are working with human beings, things change constantly,” Burger-Holt said. “Insurance changes and circumstances change. It’s one thing I never take for granted and I just stay in the moment and work to solve the puzzle.”
And though she says many people want help with their addictions, they find the system too daunting and don’t know how to access services. Because of this, Burger-Holt speaks to professional groups about how everyone can do a better job with helping those in crisis.
“It’s interesting to watch the disease part of the cycle,” she said. “People want help but we also see them sabotage the process.”
As for the media stories about opioid addiction being on the rise, especially in this part of Ohio, Burger-Holt said she thinks it’s always been high.
“What’s different now is that it’s a more dominant topic in the media,” she said. “We read and hear about it so much but the awareness may encourage others to seek help. I think we need to be careful not to focus solely on opioid addiction because alcohol addiction is even higher and more dangerous to detox.”
Despite it all, Burger-Holt said she loves waking up each day feeling like she is making a difference — not just for addicts but for those in families and extended families as well.
“We talk about the statistics of the problems, but hope is very real and recovery is possible,” she said. “It’s my responsibility to make sure people feel that hope. It’s amazing to see how much people can transform in just 30 days.”
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