Drug & Alcohol Rehab For Rushville, Indiana

Rushville, Indiana is less than an hour’s drive southeast of Indianapolis, located at the crossroads of several major roadways, including Interstate 52, Highway 4, and Highway 3. Its strategic location makes it easy for residents to access the conveniences of Indianapolis, while also being a common stopping point for those traveling between Indianapolis and Cincinnati.

There’s sometimes a bit of confusion when referring to Rushville, as it is a small city within the Rushville Township, and serves as the seat of Rush County. It also borders Circleville, an unincorporated community within the Rushville Township. The population of the latter is sometimes included in Rushville. That said, the latest official population count for the city of Rushville (according to the U.S. Census Bureau) is 6,191.

The local economy is primarily supported by manufacturing and healthcare, though the small city has struggled with rising prices and stagnant wages. The median household income in Rushville is $57,269, 18.2% lower than the median household income across Indiana. Moreover, the city has a poverty rate of 16.2%, which outpaces the state average of 12.3%. [1]

The slowed economy is just one factor that has contributed to the growing substance abuse crisis sweeping through Indiana cities like Rushville. The city, township, and county have relatively limited resources, and as a result, many residents suffer in silence. Based on the most recent data, alcohol, marijuana, and meth are the most commonly abused substances in Rushville, Indiana. The city also sees the abuse of other addictive substances, such as prescription opioids, cocaine, and heroin.

Continue reading to learn about substance abuse and addiction in Rushville, Indiana. And remember, if you or a loved one are fighting addiction in Rushville or the surrounding area, you can always reach out to Addiction Rehab Centers for help.

Drug and Alcohol Addiction in Rushville

One might assume that the small city of Rushville doesn’t have the resources to collect and evaluate its own substance abuse data, but this isn’t technically the case. In Indiana, cities of all sizes (particularly smaller ones) depend almost exclusively on county administrators to collect data related to arrests, overdoses, and fatalities. Then, the county officials organize this information for state administrators to ultimately oversee. This does make it easier for Indiana to study the data on a wider scale and craft legislation to reduce deaths and improve the quality of life for substance abusers, but it makes it harder to analyze data at a more granular level.

For example, in Rush County, Rushville is the only city, but substance abuse data collected by the county is still combined with all surrounding municipalities and unincorporated communities, including smaller towns like Carthage and Glenwood. However, Rushville is the largest municipality in the county by a wide margin, accounting for roughly 37% of the county’s population. This means that analyzing county-wide data is still an effective way to understand the severity of substance abuse and addiction in the city of Rushville alone.

The worst fear of the friends and family of substance abusers is that they will succumb to their addiction. This is why we typically look at fatal overdose data first, though it’s important to remember that it is definitely not the only factor that needs to be considered. Fortunately, fatal overdoses are relatively uncommon in Rush County, but this is partly due to the small population of just 16,752 full-time residents. [2] The table below shows how deaths involving all drugs (including alcohol) have changed in the county over the past few years.

*Data for 2023 and 2024 is provisional and may be subject to change. The last date that data was collected was 09/04/2024.

Unlike many cities throughout central and southern Indiana, Rushville has actually seen an overall decline in fatal overdoses since 2016. Between 2016 and 2022 (the most recent year with finalized data), annual overdose deaths dropped from 6 to just 1. While the data for 2023 and 2024 is still preliminary, both years have recorded less than 5 fatal overdoses thus far, indicating that the reduction in deaths could continue as more information becomes available.

When looking at a small city like Rushville, it’s important to analyze data points that provide as much information as possible. Since fatal overdoses are few and far between in Rush County, it can actually be more useful to look at non-fatal overdoses. These are far more common and, in many cases, easier to aggregate with greater accuracy. This information can be collected via hospital discharges and emergency department visits involving addictive substances. The table below shows the relevant overdose data in Rush County between 2016 and 2024: [3]

*Data for 2023 and 2024 is provisional and may be subject to change. The last date that data was collected was 09/04/2024.

While there are far more non-fatal overdoses in Rush County, the data isn’t quite as linear as it is for fatal overdoses. Non-fatal overdoses peaked at 59 in 2017 before declining for a few years and then increasing back to 55 in 2021. When just looking at the difference between 2016 and 2022, it would appear that non-fatal overdoses have increased dramatically — by 300% to be exact. Even the provisional data for 2023 indicates a small increase from 2022, though it’s unclear if non-fatal overdoses will continue to rise.

It’s also important to look at the relationship between fatal and non-fatal overdoses. In 2016, Rush County recorded 21 total overdoses (fatal plus non-fatal). 6 — or 28.5% — of these overdoses were fatal. By 2022, the total number of overdoses increased to 46, but only 1 of them was fatal — dropping the fatality rate to just 2.1%. So, while it is troubling that total overdoses are on the rise, it is a good sign that a much smaller number and percentage of these overdoses resulted in deaths.

Types of Substance Abuse in Rushville

In 2023 and 2024, alcohol, marijuana, and meth were the most abused substances in Rush County. This aligns closely with many other counties in Indiana, particularly when it comes to alcohol, which is the most commonly abused substance in the state. Additionally, marijuana and meth arrests have been on the rise in many cities and counties in the region. However, it’s important to remember that we are evaluating the types of substances being abused based solely on arrest and re-arrest records. Though this does provide an overview of substance types and how prevalent they are in a specific area, it does not account for all cases of substance abuse (namely instances where illegal activity is not directly involved).

In any case, here is the latest data from Indiana’s Next Level Recovery program showing the arrests involving different kinds of addictive substances between 2016 and 2024 in Rush County:

*Statistics for 2023 and 2024 are still preliminary and do not account for the entire calendar year(s).

Arrests have generally declined since 2016, though they have varied without much of a pattern over the past few years. A trend that we can extract from the available data is a slow but steady increase in cocaine arrests. Additionally, alcohol, marijuana, and meth arrests have remained consistently high most years, while opioid arrests have remained relatively low. Drug paraphernalia arrests, which are most often associated with meth or heroin abuse, have also remained high in Rush County.