Emergency Departments Need to Train and Hire More Sub-Specialists in Addiction Medicine

Source:

Spadaro, A., Kelly, T., Morris, J., & Heeney, M. E. (2026). Emergency Departments Need to Train and Hire More Sub-Specialists in Addiction Medicine. AEM Education and Training, 10(3), e70184. https://doi.org/10.1002/aet2.70184

According to the 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 48.4 million people in the United States had a substance use disorder (SUD), while only 19.3% of patients with SUD received substance use treatment in the past year. There are significant shortages in the addiction medicine workforce currently being addressed on systemic levels by increasing fellowship training programs and training medical professionals in the emergency departments (ED) and primary care to initiate medications for addiction treatment (MAT). Visits for substance use represent approximately 9.4% of ED presentations in the United States. While many treatments for SUD have a robust evidence base, their uptake in the ED is limited. In one study, less than 10% of patients with opioid use disorder (OUD) were initiated on buprenorphine, and in another study only 7.4% of patients received take-home naloxone after a nonfatal opioid overdose. There is a large gap in access to treatment, particularly for patients already suffering from healthcare disparities, and we have opportunities to bridge this gap and provide low barrier treatment and linkage to care through the ED. Improving care for patients with SUDs in the ED will require increased training of emergency medicine providers on addiction-related topics as well as EDs hiring more board-certified addiction medicine physicians.