WARREN, Ohio - Warren G. Harding hosted a summit on Tuesday to further educate medical professionals, law enforcement and members of the public about the state's heroin and prescription drug epidemic.

Some experts say that despite the growing problem with people abusing pain medication, if patients are forced to go cold turkey instead of being weened off, they may turn to other drugs, such as heroin.

“A big purpose of this event is really to educate the medical field not just on safer prescribing practices, but also on helping doctors work with clients to level people off, to try to take them off the opiates because they are so addictive, and if they just cut off the supply so quickly, that's when they turn to street drugs,” said April Caraway, director of the Trumbull County Mental Health and Recovery Board.

Opioid overdose deaths have seen an increase around the nation and the state. According to the Ohio Department of Health, there were 2,020 opioid related deaths in 2014, the most recent numbers that are available. In 2013, Ohio had 1,539 opioid related deaths.

In Trumbull County, 54 people died from unintentional drug overdoses in 2014, the second highest number since 2003. In 2007, Trumbull County had 58 deaths. In Mahoning, 48 deaths were recorded, the highest number recorded over the past 10 years. Mahoning also had 48 unintentional drug overdoses in 2010 and 2012.

Nationally, the American Society of Addiction Medicine reports that there were 47,055 lethal drug overdoses in 2014. Opioid addiction was the cause of more than 40 percent of those deaths.