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It took more than 10 minutes for paramedics to arrive after a housekeeper found a man collapsed on the floor of a bathroom in a Boston Veteran Affairs building.

The paramedics immediately administered naloxone, often known by its brand name Narcan, to successfully听reverse the man鈥檚 opioid overdose. But it takes only a few minutes without oxygen for brain damage to begin.

Pam Bellino, patient safety manager for the Boston VA, read that incident report in December 2015 with alarm. 鈥淭hat was the tipping point for us to say, 鈥榃e need to get this naloxone immediately available, without locking it up,鈥欌�� she said.

The easiest way to do it quickly, Bellino reasoned, would be to add the drug to the automated external defibrillator, or AED, cabinets already in place. Those metal boxes on the walls of VA cafeterias, gyms, warehouses, clinic waiting rooms and some rehab housing were installed to hold equipment for a fast response to heart attacks.

Now the VA, building on the project started in Boston, is moving to add naloxone kits to the AED cabinets in its buildings across the country, an initiative that could become a model for other health care organizations.

Equipping police with nasal spray naloxone is becoming more common across the country, but there has been some resistance to making the drug available in public.

Bellino has heard from critics who say easy access to naloxone gives drug users a false sense of safety. She disagrees.

鈥淭hink of this as you would a seat belt or an air bag,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t by no means fixes the problem, but what it does is save a life.鈥�

Giving naloxone to someone who hasn鈥檛 overdosed isn鈥檛 harmful, but it is a prescription drug. So, Bellino said, the VA had to persuade the accrediting agency,听听to approve guidelines for the AED naloxone project.

The cabinets must be sealed and alarmed so staff can tell if they鈥檝e been opened. They must be checked daily and refilled when听the naloxone kits expire.

The commission didn鈥檛 agree to let the VA put the words 鈥渘aloxone鈥� or 鈥淣arcan鈥� on the cabinet doors to alert the public that the drug is inside, but did allow the VA to affix the letter 鈥淣.鈥�

In December, the project will expand nationwide, as VA hospitals across the country will add naloxone to their AED cabinets.

鈥淭he overwhelming evidence is that it just saves lives,鈥� said听听with the VA鈥檚 Center for Innovation. 鈥淲e鈥檙e hopeful that other health systems take notice and think about doing the same.鈥�

The contents of the naloxone kit inside an AED box located in the VA West Roxbury cafeteria.(Jesse Costa/WBUR)

Vets have听, compared with civilians, said听, an investigator with the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, citing 2005 death data. She said it isn鈥檛 clear why veterans are more likely to OD, but many do have complex medical conditions.

鈥淪ome of that鈥檚 related to combat exposure,鈥� Bohnert said. 鈥淭hey鈥檝e got mental health treatment needs. They may have injuries that result in them being more likely to be prescribed opioids than your average person. And all of these things can impact their risk of overdose.鈥�

A smattering of schools, airports, churches and employers around the country have added naloxone to their AED cabinets.

Some stock other lifesaving tools as well: tourniquets to听听after a shooting; EpiPens to keep airways open; and even injectors to treat diabetic shock.

Dr. Jeremy Cushman leads a project at the University of Rochester that has placed both tourniquets and naloxone in 80 AED cabinets across that campus as of July.

鈥淭his system is already in place,鈥� Cushman said. 鈥淭he question is, how can we leverage it to save more lives?鈥�

Turning AED cabinets into miniature emergency medical stations presents challenges, Cushman said. Medicines can鈥檛 be left outside during extreme temperatures. They are expensive and expire.

Dr. Scott Weiner, president of the Massachusetts College of Emergency Physicians, said he has dealt with those issues while developing street-level dispensing stations for naloxone.

And then there鈥檚 the belief among some critics that naloxone enables drug use by offering an assurance of life after an overdose. Weiner said that attitude is waning and, as it does, the public may be more open to other controversial, lifesaving measures.

鈥淣aloxone is kind of the lowest barrier for people to understand, where someone has already overdosed and we鈥檙e going to give them the antidote,鈥� Weiner said. 鈥淭he leap to giving them needles [through a needle exchange] or allowing them to inject in a safe space, that鈥檚 just another level of acceptance that people will have to get to.鈥�

The Boston VA鈥檚 Bellino said she hopes that AED manufacturers will start selling cabinets that meet the new hospital accreditation standards. So far, the Boston VA counts 132 lives saved through all three parts of its naloxone project: training high-risk veterans, equipping police and the AED cabinets.

This story is part of a reporting partnership that includes , and Kaiser Health News.