Hospital teaching team keeps fighting opioid crisis
Which student learns best with hospital teams fighting opioid crisis? Understanding how students learn is perhaps the most important way to improve addiction training.
In a new article published by the Substance Abuse journal, we report findings suggesting that the completion of an elective with a hospital-based Addiction Medicine Consult Team appeared to improve knowledge of medical students more than of other types of students. Read more below or listen to the podcast.
Firstly, we found that both emerging and established physicians appear to be responsive to this type of training. Secondly, the learner self-assessment can provide valuable feedback to the consultants. Then, consultants can focus more on the students who learn less.
Keep fighting opioid crisis through training
The study sample was drawn from medical students, residents and physicians who took part in a month-long rotation with a hospital-based addiction medicine consult team in Vancouver, Canada. The addiction rotation includes full-time clinical training involving intake assessment and treatment planning. And referrals to community agencies and starting people on evidence-based medications for substance use disorders. The students take part in didactic lectures, bedside teaching, journal clubs and some prepare papers for submission to peer-reviewed journals. Each year, about 80 learners go through the program. Furthermore, learners rate their knowledge before and after the training.
At the end, all learners reported increased knowledge. One group, however, learned more than the others – the medical students. This two-year study confirms that a structured clinical training program can lead to an increased knowledge on addiction and that medical students benefit from it the most.
For more info read the full article at:
Gorfinkel, L., Klimas, J., Ahamad, K., Mead, A., McLean, M., Fairgrieve, C., Nolan, S., Small, W., Cullen, W., Wood, E., Fairbairn, N. (2019) In-hospital training in addiction medicine: A mixed methods study of health care provider benefits and differences. Substance Abuse (Published online Jan 28) doi: 10.1080/08897077.2018.1561596
If interested, you can also read: What can hospital teams teach medical students about addiction to help curb the opioid overdose epidemic?
Hospital teaching teams confront iatrogenic opioid addiction
Or visit a post that talks about this research as it was presented at the Canadian Society for Addiction Medicine link here