Feasibility of Pediatric Emergency Department-Initiated Treatment for Adolescents With Opioid Use Disorder

The opioid epidemic is a serious public health crisis that affects all age groups. Emergency departments (EDs) are on the front line of this public health crisis. Buprenorphine is an Opioid Use Disorder (OUD) treatment that reduces opioid overdose mortality by up to 70%. A landmark 2015 randomized controlled trial (RCT) also demonstrated effectiveness of ED-initiated buprenorphine in improving OUD treatment engagement rates in adults. As a result, EDs across the nation have begun to follow these practices. This model of evidence-based treatment is a paradigm shift for care delivery and ripe for adaptation to special populations, such as adolescents. Adolescents with OUD need easy access to treatment now more than ever: fentanyl use is on the rise, the COVID-19 pandemic has heralded historic levels of social isolation in this age group, and the opioid overdose death rate is increasing.

Little research has examined how the ED can engage adolescents and their families in effective OUD treatment. Buprenorphine is an evidence-based treatment for OUD in adolescents. Three RCTs in ambulatory settings have demonstrated the efficacy of buprenorphine in reducing opioid use and improving treatment retention in adolescents with OUD. Given its efficacy, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that pediatricians offer buprenorphine to adolescents with severe OUD or discuss referrals to other providers for this service. Despite the immense efforts to improve access to buprenorphine, youth with OUD continue to have markedly low rates of receiving this life-saving medication. A study of Medicaid-enrolled adolescents with OUD found that between 2014 and 2015, only 3.3% of 13-15 year-old and 6.9% of 16-17 year-old patients received OUD treatment medication within 3 months of diagnosis. Treatment receipt is even lower among adolescents experiencing opioid overdose; only 0.5% of 13-15 year-old and 0.8% of 16-17 year-old adolescents receive pharmacotherapy within 30 days of the overdose. Research is urgently needed to identify effective strategies to address the enormous treatment gap for adolescents with OUD.

ED-initiated buprenorphine with brief intervention and facilitated referral to treatment has been shown to be highly successful in increasing treatment engagement rates and reducing opioid use among adults. It is unknown whether this intervention is similarly effective for adolescents with OUD. To rigorously examine this important clinical research question, it is first necessary to optimize this intervention for the adolescent population. In this R34 proposal, we will use the Assessment-Decision-Administration-Production-Topic Experts-Integration-Training-Testing (ADAPT-ITT) framework-a systematic method for intervention adaptation- to adapt (Aim 1) and test the feasibility (Aim 2) of a treatment strategy for adolescents that has been shown to effectively link adults with OUD to ongoing addiction treatment. We aim to:

Aim 1: Optimize the intervention of ED-initiated buprenorphine with brief intervention and facilitated referral to treatment for adolescents (ages 13 years old until their 18th birthdays) with OUD (Year 1). Recognizing the novelty of ED-initiated treatment for OUD in adolescents, and the importance of ensuring that the evidence-based intervention components are relevant to the target population, we will use the ADAPT-ITT framework to systematically refine the intervention. Focus groups and in-depth interviews with key stakeholders will examine: 1) perceptions of ED-initiated buprenorphine, brief intervention and facilitated referral to treatment for adolescents, 2) preferences for content and delivery of the intervention, and 3) strategies to increase awareness and acceptability of the ED as an access site for treatment and linkage to care for adolescents. Data will be used to adapt intervention for EDs that treat adolescents and inform the development of updated intervention training protocols.

Aim 2. Conduct a single-arm pilot study of the intervention developed in Aim 1 to examine the feasibility of enrolling and collecting outcomes from adolescents (ages 13 years-old until their 18th birthdays) with OUD presenting to 4 pediatric EDs (Year 2). We will conduct this pilot study in 4 geographically diverse EDs within the Pediatric Emergency Care Applied Research Network (PECARN). PECARN is the only federally-funded pediatric emergency medicine research network with the robust infrastructure to identify and efficiently enroll a sufficient number of adolescents with OUD into an ED-based clinical trial. We hypothesize:

Hypothesis 1: We will enroll adolescents with OUD at a recruitment rate of at least 1 patient/site/month.

Hypothesis 2: We will retain 80% of participants at 30 days, as defined by the successful collection of the 30-day outcomes of treatment engagement, self-report of opioid use in the previous 7 days and urine toxicology for opioids.

Impact: The findings will inform our planned large-scale implementation trial of ED-initiated treatment in adolescents which could improve outcomes and ultimately save the lives of numerous U.S adolescents. The ADAPT-ITT process and feasibility study directly responds to an urgent need to design and test developmentally-appropriate OUD treatment engagement strategies for this age group.