- A Kaiser Health News investigation found that many hospitals don’t have specialists who know how to treat addiction. While hospitals employ numerous clinicians – physicians, nurses, therapists, or social workers – who can support patients with heart, lung, or kidney diseases, very few have the same types of clinicians who either specialize or even know how to help support patients with an addiction or a condition related to drug or alcohol use. Some hospitals have named addiction as a specialty and hired people with specific training. However, other hospitals say adding addiction specialists is too costly or that they don’t want to initiate a medication treatment while patients are in the hospital because they don’t know where to refer patients after they’ve been discharged. (Article here)
October 11, 2022
Opioid/Substance Use Disorders