Michael Weaver, MD, on Substance Misuse Management in Primary Care

In this video, Michael Weaver, MD, discusses key takeaways of his session from our Practical Updates in Primary Care 2021 Virtual Series, on the recognition and management of substance misuse.

Additional Resources:

Practical Updates in Primary Care newsroom.

For more information about PUPC 2021 Virtual Series and to register for upcoming sessions, visit https://practicalupdates.consultant360.com/.

Michael Weaver, MD, is the medical director for the Center of Neurobehavioral Research on Addiction and a professor of psychiatry at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

TRANSCRIPT:

Michael Weaver:  Hello, my name is Dr Michael Weaver. I'm a professor in the department of psychiatry at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. I hope you enjoyed the presentation that I gave on recognition and management of substance abuse, especially in the primary care setting.

We went over a number of different aspects of this in the talk. Just to refresh your memory a little bit, we talked a little bit about how addiction develops, and the fact that it's a brain disease. We also talked about some of the different classes of drugs that are commonly encountered in the primary care setting, and how they're similar to and different from one another.

We went over some screen tools to use, especially a simple one, The NIDA Quick Screen, that can be utilized in a primary care setting. If that's positive, then there are some mnemonics such as the 5 As and the 5 Rs, that can be useful to help remember what you would do with a patient when you're talking to them about management of a substance use disorder, and what the next steps might be.

We also talked a little bit about what those next steps are for patients, including medications that can be prescribed by clinicians in the primary care setting especially for commonly used substances like tobacco and alcohol. We also talked about referral for more definitive specialty care for substance use disorders to addiction medicine, or addiction psychiatry, and some resources that can be used for those referrals.

I hope you enjoyed the conference. I look forward to any questions that you may have. Thank you for your attention and have a good day.