New London — Lawrence + Memorial Hospital is providing a year’s supply of the opioid antidote drug Narcan to at least six of the region’s police departments, calling it a lifesaving tool that is needed because of the severity of the current heroin epidemic.

The hospital decided to supply Narcan after getting a request from Waterford Police Chief Brett Mahoney this spring, and “we saw immediate results. Within hours, it saved a life,” Ron Kersey, emergency medical services coordinator for L+M, said at a news conference at the hospital Monday.

The hospital provided 30 doses of the drug to Waterford police, and trained officers in how and when to administer it, he said. EMTs and paramedics have been supplied with Narcan for over a year, but often, he said, police are first to arrive at an overdose scene. By the time an ambulance crew arrives to administer Narcan, it could be too late, Kersey said.

After L+M agreed to provide Narcan to Waterford police, Mahoney contacted other local police departments about their need for Narcan and forwarded their requests to L+M. Stonington police contacted L+M directly and received 25 doses.

The hospital has now agreed to also provide a year’s supply of single-dose Narcan kits, at a cost of about $40 each, to departments in East Lyme, Groton City, Groton Town and Ledyard, and requests from at least two other departments are pending. The total expenditure has not yet been calculated, because it will depend on the number of doses each town needs, hospital officials said.

“Given the financial stress L+M and other hospitals are under these days, we had to put some thought into this,” said Bruce Cummings, chief executive officer of L+M. “But we took stock of our mission — to improve the health of our region — and we felt the scope of the crisis is so extraordinary” that finding funds within the existing emergency medical services budget to provide Narcan was the right thing to do.

He added that Narcan is “a very small part” of the larger community response that is needed to combat the crisis, including the need for more addiction recovery and detoxification and prevention programs.

From January through March of this year, L+M treated 47 heroin overdose patients at its emergency department, according to figures provided by L+M spokesman Mike O’Farrell. If that rate continues, the number of heroin overdoses in 2016 will be greater than all those in 2014, when there were 74 heroin overdoses, combined with 2015, when the hospital treated 111 overdoses, O’Farrell said.

Dr. Deirdre Cronin, emergency department physician at L+M, said Narcan “is not a cure-all, but what it does give us is a chance to bring someone back who is not breathing, who is unconscious and may be in cardiac arrest.”

After the effects of heroin or other opioid are reversed with Narcan and the patient is stabilized, she said there is a “brief window” when addicts can be encouraged to enter a treatment program, if one with an available slot is found in time.

“Narcan is that first step that gives that person another chance,” she said.

She noted that the heroin being used by overdose patients recently is very potent and often mixed with synthetic drugs such as Fentaynl, requiring large doses of Narcan to counteract the effects.

Kersey added that “follow-up is critical” after addicts receive Narcan so they get into treatment, “but they still have to have the opportunity to survive.”

Tammy de la Cruz of Groton, who helped found the grass-roots group Community Speaks Out in response to the heroin crisis, said Narcan is as important to combating the disease of addiction as insulin is to treating the disease of diabetes.

“For us, Narcan is our insulin,” she said.

j.benson@theday.com