Primary Care Specialties: Addiction Treatment Tools, Training, and Resources
We need more physicians that are willing to educate, treat, and advocate on behalf of their patients suffering with addiction. Addiction medicine has been an ABMS subspecialty since 2016, and certification requirements will change after 2021. The time to sub-specialize and become board certified is now. Join us in this journey to end addiction. - Flora Sadri-Azarbayejani, DO, MPH, FAAFP, FASAM – Family Medicine
In 2018, approximately 20.3 million people aged 12 or older had a substance use disorder (SUD) related to their use of alcohol or illicit drugs in the past year.ⁱ
According to a 2017 SAMHSA study, 1 in 8 children lived in households where at least one parent had a substance use disorder.ⁱⁱ
Treatment Resources:
Medication Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder in the Primary Care Setting
Office-based opioid treatment (OBOT) programs allow providers to expand access to treatment for opioid use disorder (OUD), including medication and psychosocial treatment, by offering treatment in physicians' offices rather than in traditional treatment clinics and providing another setting in which individuals who are opioid dependent can receive effective treatment.
ASAM National Practice Guideline
The ASAM National Practice Guideline 2020 focused update is intended to inform and empower clinicians, health system administrators, criminal justice system administrators, and policymakers who are interested in implementing evidence-based practices to improve outcomes for individuals with OUD. This is especially critical in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 emergency, which threatens to curtail patient access to evidence-based treatment.
https://www.asam.org/Quality-Science/quality/2020-national-practice-guideline
The ASAM Appropriate Use of Drug Testing in Clinical Addiction Medicine
ASAM developed the Appropriate Use of Drug Testing in Clinical Addiction Medicine document to provide guidance about the effective use of drug testing in the identification, diagnosis, treatment and promotion of recovery for patients with, or at risk for, addiction.
https://www.asam.org/Quality-Science/quality/drug-testing
ASAM Policy Statement on Prevention
The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) supports a wide variety of measures to prevent alcohol and other drug related problems in contemporary society, understanding that carefully thought out prevention measures have demonstrably reduced the early onset of alcohol, nicotine, and other drug use in some populations. This has contributed to a reduction in deaths and serious injuries resulting from drug related injuries and illnesses. These and other identifiable results have major economic implications.
NIAAA Alcohol Screening and Brief Intervention Pocket Guide
https://pubs.niaaa.nih.gov/publications/practitioner/PocketGuide/pocket_guide.htm
https://www.rethinkingdrinking.niaaa.nih.gov/
NIDA SUDs in Adolescents: Screening and Engagement in Primary Care Settings
https://webcampus.drexelmed.edu/nida/module_2/default_FrameSet.htm
Family Physicians
Review recent substance use and addiction publications, resources, and more specifically for family physicians.
Pediatrics
Review recent substance use and addiction publications, courses, and more for pediatricians.
On-Demand Training Opportunities:
The ASAM National Practice Guideline 2020 Focused Update Webinar – Adolescents & Young Adults
This webinar follows the ASAM National Practice Guideline 2020 Focused Update Fundamentals webinar, which outlines the new and updated recommendations in the 2020 Focused Update of the National Practice Guideline for the Treatment of Opioid Use Disorder.
Adolescents and young adults present for treatment with a broad spectrum of opioid use disorder severity with a range of co-occurring medical and psychiatric illnesses. The treatment of youth with opioid use disorder presents many unique medical, legal, and ethical dilemmas that may complicate treatment. Given these unique issues, adolescents and young adults often benefit from services designed specifically for them. This webinar will provide an overview of the new and updated recommendations and in-depth information on treating youth with OUD from the ASAM National Practice Guideline.
ⁱ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. (2019). Key substance use and mental health indicators in the United States: Results from the 2018 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (HHS Publication No. PEP19-5068, NSDUH Series H-54). Rockville, MD: Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Retrieved from https://www.samhsa.gov/data/
ⁱⁱ Lipari, R.N. and Van Horn, S.L. Children living with parents who have a substance use disorder. The CBHSQ Report: August 24, 2017. Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Rockville, MD.