Improving the Care of Opioid Use Disorder and Pain

October 17, 2022

Two Northwestern and IPHAM-affiliated researchers, Sara Becker, PhD, the Alice Hamilton Professor of Psychiatry and director of IPHAM’s Center for Dissemination and Implementation Science, and C Hendricks Brown, PhD, professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Medical Social Sciences, are multiple principal investigators on a $15.8 million center grant funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA).

The grant supports a “Research Adoption Support Center,” a center that provides coordination and implementation support to a network of newly funded HEAL Data2Action Innovation Projects. The Data2Action Projects are tasked with rapidly using real-world data to improve the care of opioid use disorder (OUD) and pain. The contact principal investigator is Mark P McGovern, PhD, from Stanford University. Multiple Principal Investigators include Becker and Brown of Northwestern and Will Becker, PhD, of Yale University.

Northwestern’s role is to direct two of the major scientific cores. Brown will lead the Research and Evaluation Core, which will provide implementation science expertise to the projects and conduct a formative evaluation of the Data2Action network. Becker will lead the Substance Use Disorder Implementation Support Core, which will help projects to select, implement, and sustain evidence-based practices to address specific service delivery gaps related to OUD.

Becker and Brown are also each directors of major research components of a recently awarded $10 million Clinical Research Center Grant (P50) focused on dissemination and implementation of effective addiction services funded by NIDA, so there will be multiple opportunities for synergy and cross-fertilization across these major projects.

“I am thrilled to be able to partner with Hendricks to lead this center as part of the landmark HEAL Data2Action Initiative. The combination of this new U2C center and our new P50 presents an unparalleled opportunity to advance the dissemination and implementation of effective addiction health services,” said Becker.

“The number of people dying from overdose in the US has exceeded 100,000 this last year, more than a 25% rise from the year before. There has been a growing recognition that these unacceptably high rates are due not from a lack of effective prevention or treatments, but rather from absent or inadequate delivery systems,” said Brown. “By bringing in modern implementation science approaches to the field of addiction and partnering with local decision makers, we intend to reduce these deaths in specific communities and point the ways that other communities can follow.”