About the Webinar:
The National Viral Hepatitis Roundtable, in partnership with the Empire Liver Foundation and HepCure, hosted a webinar on prescribing buprenorphine in hepatitis care settings. In this webinar Dr. Maggie Lowenstein discusses practical ways to prescribe medication for opioid use disorder in a patient-centered manner.
Objectives:
1. Review components of buprenorphine induction and maintenance visits for patients with opioid use disorder.
2. Identify mechanisms to address common challenges encountered when managing patients on buprenorphine.
3. Discuss ways to provide treatment for patients with opioid use disorder in a patient-centered manner.
About Dr. Lowenstein:
Dr. Margaret (Maggie) Lowenstein is a general internist, addiction medicine physician, and an Assistant Professor of Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine.
Dr. Lowenstein’s research focuses on novel strategies for implementing evidence-based harm reduction and treatment for opioid and other substance use disorders, particularly the use of low-barrier treatment models for opioid use disorder. She also practices integrated primary care and addiction medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and provides addiction treatment on Prevention Point Philadelphia’s mobile outreach unit. Dr. Lowenstein received her undergraduate degree at Williams College, a Master’s degree in Biology and Biological Anthropology at the University of Cambridge as a Herchel Smith Fellow, and her medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. She completed her residency training in internal medicine at the University of California, San Francisco in the UCSF primary care program and then a fellowship in health policy with the National Clinicians Scholars Program at Penn.
Background:
In April 2020 HHS issued new Practice Guidelines on prescribing buprenorphine for opioid use disorder (HHS press release here). The guidelines represent a step forward in increasing access to medication-assisted treatment by eliminating the mandatory training requirement for DEA-registered healthcare providers (MD/DO or APP) who are treating 30 or fewer patients at a time. Of note, the guidelines maintain the X-waiver requirement for all providers.
NVHR believes that access to buprenorphine is a critical strategy to eliminate viral hepatitis. If you’re interested in prescribing buprenorphine in your practice, you may apply for an X-waiver here by following the steps in the infographic below.
Additional Resources for Prescribing: