Partnership offers new hope to patients with opioid addiction

Advocate South Suburban Hospital, in Hazel Crest, Ill., and The South Suburban Council on Alcohol and Substance Abuse, a Hazel Crest-based treatment facility, have entered a formal partnership that offers new hope to South Chicagoland families and individuals struggling with opioid addiction.

Specially-trained Advocate South Suburban emergency physicians recently began administering Medication Assisted Treatments (MAT) - the FDA-approved medications Methadone, Buprenorphine and XR-Naltrexone - to offer patients seeking treatment for withdrawal and other painful symptoms related to opioid drug addiction a fighting chance for sobriety.

Patients receiving MAT in the Advocate South Suburban Emergency Department are automatically referred to the South Suburban Council for continuation of their recovery care.

“Regardless of whether they are in the form of prescribed painkillers or illicit drugs, opioids are highly addictive and nearly impossible to overcome through abstention treatments, like 12 Steps, alone,” says Dr. Ronald Lawton, an emergency medicine physician at Advocate South Suburban Hospital. “The partnership between Advocate and the South Suburban Council provides a seamless, continuum of care that addresses the physical, emotional and practical barriers that often stand in the way of sobriety.”

MATs make quitting a real possibility by effectively preventing withdrawal symptoms, relieving or reducing drug cravings, and blocking the effects of taking opioids. These medications help patients feel “normal” as they either complete the stages of drug withdrawal or are gradually weaned from the drug. As a result, patients can focus on counselling needs, employment and housing, instead of the physically-challenging aspects of quitting.

“The odds of reaching one-year sobriety are many times higher when people with opioid overuse disorder use MAT as part of a multi-faceted approach to treatment,” Dr. Lawton adds.

“Having a formal relationship with Advocate South Suburban empowers us – the patient, the counselor and the physician– to turn lives around right here in the emergency room,” says Dr. Eileen Couture, medical director, South Suburban Council. “Now that we can refer patients to treatment immediately after their discharge from the Emergency Room, our two organizations are in better position to reduce the number of Illinois lives being claimed by opioid addiction.”

In 2017, opioid-related overdoses claimed the lives of 2,199 Illinoisans, the state says. That’s nearly twice the number of homicides and more than double the number of those killed in car accidents in Chicago. This total nearly doubles the number of Illinois lives claimed by overdoses in 2013.