Beth collaborated with fellow anthropologist Anastasia Hudgins (together as Ethnologica) and the Philadelphia Department of Public Health, Division of Substance Use and Harm Reduction on a mixed methods study interrogating factors that lead to home-based opioid use and overdose in Philadelphia.

As qualitative research directors, they designed data collection and study recruitment protocols, recruited and tracked study participants and collected, coded, and analyzed data. They conducted in-depth interviews with Philadelphians who lost family members to opioid overdose with the goal of improving harm reduction programming in the city. Qualitative data highlighted the urgency to collaborate with impacted families and communities to design relevant harm reduction interventions aimed at home-based opioid use.

Along with producing program, policy and outreach recommendations to enhance harm reduction efforts including naloxone administration, the following peer-reviewed articles resulted from the study:

Uzwiak, Beth (2022) Everything Was Like a Brick Wall: Framing Kin Resistance to Opioid Overdose in Philadelphia. Medical Anthropology. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2022.2032043

Uzwiak, Beth (2021) Quit Ditching the Love: Kinship and Death from Opioid Overdose in Philadelphia.  Journal for the Anthropology of North America.  DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/NAD.12148

Uzwiak, Beth, A. Hudgins and L. Pizzicato (2021) Legacies of the War on Drugs: Next of Kin of Persons Who Died of Opioid Overdose and Harm Reduction Interventions in Philadelphia. International Journal of Drug Policy. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2021.103351

Hudgins, A., B. Uzwiak, L. Pizzicato and K. Viner (2021) Barriers to Effective Care: Specialty Drug Treatment in Philadelphia.  Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment.  DOI: 10.1016/j.jsat.2021.108639