New Baltimore initiative hopes to more closely involve hospitals in fight against opioid epidemic (Baltimore Sun)

Sunday Apr 29th, 2018

Baltimore officials will announce an initiative on Monday meant to give the city’s 11 hospitals incentive to play a bigger role in ending the opioid epidemic.

The plan calls for implementing best practices for hospitals to use when they are faced with patients who overdose or have problems with opioid use. The city will publicly recognize hospitals that follow these guidelines.

“Hospitals alone cannot end this epidemic, but it cannot be ended without them,” Dr. Leana Wen, Baltimore’s health commissioner, said in a statement. “Addiction is a disease and treatment exists. Together, we will build upon the work that’s already been done and make Baltimore City a national model for treating addiction alongside every other disease. That means treating addiction in our traditional health care institutions, including hospitals.”

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When I’ve asked experts about these approaches, it’s not that any of them are bad. It’s that they fall short. For instance, Leana Wen, the former health commissioner of Baltimore (and soon-to-be president of Planned Parenthood), said that the Support for Patients and Communities Act “is simply tinkering around the edges.”

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