Hospital-based clinicians lack knowledge and comfort in initiating medications for opioid use disorder: opportunities for training innovation

BACKGROUND: Hospital-based clinicians infrequently initiate medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD) for hospitalized patients. Our objective was to understand hospital-based clinicians’ knowledge, comfort, attitudes, and motivations regarding MOUD initiation to target quality improvement initiatives. METHODS: General medicine attending physicians and physician assistants at an academic medical center completed questionnaires eliciting barriers to MOUD initiation, including knowledge, comfort, attitudes and motivations regarding MOUD. We explored whether clinicians who had initiated MOUD in the prior 12 months differed in knowledge, comfort, attitudes, and motivations from those who had not. RESULTS: One-hundred forty-three clinicians completed the survey with 55% reporting having initiated MOUD for a hospitalized patient during the prior 12 months. Common barriers to MOUD initiation were: (1) Not enough experience (86%); (2) Not enough training (82%); (3) Need for more addiction specialist support (76%). Overall, knowledge of and comfort with MOUD was low, but motivation to address OUD was high. Compared to MOUD non-initiators, a greater proportion of MOUD initiators answered knowledge questions correctly, agreed or strongly agreed that they wanted to treat OUD (86% vs. 68%, p = 0.009), and agreed or strongly agreed that treatment of OUD with medication was more effective than without medication (90% vs. 75%, p = 0.022). CONCLUSIONS: Hospital-based clinicians had favorable attitudes toward MOUD and are motivated to initiate MOUD, but they lacked knowledge of and comfort with MOUD initiation. To increase MOUD initiation for hospitalized patients, clinicians will need additional training and specialist support.