Medications for Opioid Use Disorder in Various Treatment Settings

Course overview

Course Description: This course is based upon material published in the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine and is available as an open-access article. Medication-based treatment is effective across all treatment settings studied to date. Withholding or failing to have available all classes of U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved medication for the treatment of opioid use disorder in any care or criminal justice setting is denying appropriate medical treatment. Access to medications for treating opioid use disorder (OUD) is highly variable across different types of treatment settings. Although overall roughly 36 percent of SUD treatment facilities offer medication to patients, only about 6 percent provide patients with a choice of all three U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved medications (amfAR, 2018; Mojtabai et al., 2019). This chapter reviews the evidence on differences in medication access and use in different treatment settings and, to the extent that it is available, any scientific rationale underpinning those differences. This course on medications for opioid use disorder is designed for social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, nurses, and substance abuse counselors, who do clinical work. In addition, this course is appropriate for beginning, intermediate and advanced level practitioners who wish to develop their knowledge of medications for opioid use disorder. The course material includes a literature review of interventions. It may also be useful for licensed clinicians who require continuing clinical education courses for license renewal. The course is based on a journal article that includes research. It contains statistical analysis and data that some clinicians enjoy reading and others do not. A significant benefit of reading research-based articles for continuing education is they provide practitioners with the latest findings in their field. Authors: National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine Learning Objectives: This course will provide the practitioner with detailed information regarding medications for opioid use disorder. Specifically, a professional will: 1. Recognize characteristics of opioid treatment programs and office based opioid treatments. 2. Identify the role of acute care settings in the treatment of opioid use disorder. 3. Describe special considerations for using medication to treat opioid use disorder in criminal justice settings. Citation: National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. (2019). Medications for Opioid Use Disorder Save Lives. The National Academies Press. https://nap.nationalacademies.org/read/25310/chapter/1#ii