Substance Use Disorder Support Services

Since the launch of the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline in 2022, counselors have answered more than 10 million calls, texts and chats from people seeking help for suicidal thoughts and mental health crises, according to HHS officials.

Quantitative pupillometry may be a reliable method of assessing clinically intoxicated patients in EDs, per a study published in the Journal of the American College of Emergency Physicians Open.

HHS has proposed changes to a regulation that protects patient privacy and records concerning treatment related to substance use challenges from unauthorized disclosures. According to a release from HHS, the move was made through the Office for Civil Rights and SAMHSA.

Medicare beneficiaries have less geographic accessibility to substance use disorder treatment facilities, as Medicare acceptance is lower compared with other kinds of payment, per a study published in JAMA Network Open.

HHS has announced the availability of $10 million in substance misuse grant funding through the Health Resources and Services Administration’s Rural Communities Opioid Response Program.

HHS has announced nearly $15 million in funding will be granted for rural communities to address psychostimulant misuse and related overdose deaths.

A treatment mode specifically targeting prevention of addiction-related suicide is superior to customary care for improving knowledge, behaviors and help-seeking, according to a randomized clinical trial published in JAMA Network Open.

Adolescents who reported multiple symptoms of severe substance use disorder were more likely to report these symptoms in adulthood, according to findings published in JAMA Network Open.

RWJBarnabas Health in New Jersey provides full-time peer recovery specialists 24 hours a day at its hospitals as part of the health care system’s comprehensive efforts to address the opioid epidemic while improving how it approaches pain management. Through its Tackling Addiction Task Force, the system launched a multidisciplinary, multi-pronged initiative called Deliberate Reduction of Opioid Prescribing or DROP focused not only on reduction of opioid prescribing, but on enhancing how the system treats pain. This includes educating medical staff on appropriate opioid prescribing, increasing the use of evidence-based alternative practices in pain management, offering patients with substance use disorder support services and medication-assisted therapy, as needed, and building a network outside the system that creates seamless linkages to services once patients are discharged.