Emergency Departments Could Play Larger Role in Treating Substance Abuse Patients

Research presented at American Academy of Pain Medicine’s 2019 Annual Meeting shows that hospitals have an opportunity to embody a more substantial role in treating substance use disorder (SUD) patients in emergency departments (EDs), according to Veronica G. Brown, DrPH, MPH, College of Pharmacy, and colleagues.

“EDs are commonly used as an alternative to primary care. Limited research has examined persons visiting EDs for an SUD using national data,” said Dr Brown and colleagues. “The purpose of this study was to examine the characteristics of persons visiting EDs for SUD.”

The cross-sectional study comprised data from the National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NHAMCS) between 2011 and 2015 included a national probability sample of visits to EDs of 600 noninstitutional hospitals, as explained by the poster abstract. 

Dr Brown and colleagues explained, “Patient-level factors were included as independent variables, whereas SUD was applied as the dependent variable (eg, drug abuse) in bivariate analyses, conducted using chi-square tests. Potential confounders were controlled for in multinomial logistic regression models.”

According to the results of the research, 0.41% of a total of 101,765 patients visited the ED for drug abuse, individuals with a mental health condition (MHC) were 6 times more likely to visit for drug abuse, and persons visiting for pain were 61% less likely to have abused drugs compared with those without pain.

“This study revealed that those who visited EDs with MHCs were more likely to have a SUD,” concluded Dr Brown and colleagues. “EDs can play a substantial role in treating persons with MHCs and preventing SUD to help facilitate the continuum of care.” —Edan Stanley