Study: Collaborative healthcare treatment can help opioid addicts

By Staff Writer

A new report from Boston University (BU) researchers indicates that a collaborative-care approach can help opioid addicts recover from their condition.

The study, which appears in the journal Archives of Internal Medicine, examined office-based opioid treatment (OBOT). Between 2003 and 2008, more than 400 patients with opioid addictions were treated with bupreheorphine, a drug that aims to curb substance abuse, while receiving collaborative care from generalist physicians and nurse care managers.

After a year of treatment, a total of 51 percent of participants were no longer using painkillers. Of the patients who remained in treatment at six, nine and 12 months, approximately 93 percent had successfully overcome their opioid addictions.

BU officials suggested that office-based treatment in a primary care setting can be helpful for opioid addicts if physicians and nurses collaborate. In addition, this approach can help lessen the cost burden of treating these individuals in a hospital setting, which requires significantly more resources.

Problem teens who are addicted to painkillers may benefit from wilderness therapy camps, many of which provide help for troubled adolescents.