Addicted Physicians
Addictions have no socioeconomic boundaries and about 10-12 percent of physicians in our country develop a substance abuse disorder.
The field of addiction medicine has matured greatly in the past 20 years and has progressed from basic science and anecdote to large-scale clinical studies with meaningful outcomes.
In a recent article in the British Medical Journal (BMJ 2008;337:a2038) they published a five-year outcomes study of a large cohort of U.S. physicians treated for substance. Each state has some sort of physician health program to assist with these physicians. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of these state physician health programs.
It is important to note that these programs do not treat physicians but rather provide assessment and triage into care systems, and then carry out post-treatment monitoring. The ISMA’s Physician Assistance Program functions in this way.
The BMJ study concluded that about three-fourths of U.S. physicians with substance use disorders managed in physician health programs had favorable outcomes at five years. The data suggest that these programs, including the ISMA’s program, operate not only in the interest of the individual physician, but also in the interest of public safety.
The results showed that 95 percent of physicians who completed monitoring in the study were licensed and working as physicians five years later. This clinical data tell us why it is so important to extend a helping hand to our chemically dependent colleagues.
This research is important for physicians to understand who serve on hospital credentialing committees or executive committees as well as to non-medical committee members (administrators and attorneys) who may drift toward other less successful strategies.
There is ample evidence supporting intervention and medical treatment rather than the punitive pathway and anecdotal experience suggests punishment without rehabilitation actually brings opposite results, driving the problem further “underground.”
This not only serves the physician poorly, but also quite possibly decreases patient safety.
The field of addiction medicine has matured greatly in the past 20 years and has progressed from basic science and anecdote to large-scale clinical studies with meaningful outcomes.
In a recent article in the British Medical Journal (BMJ 2008;337:a2038) they published a five-year outcomes study of a large cohort of U.S. physicians treated for substance. Each state has some sort of physician health program to assist with these physicians. The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of these state physician health programs.
It is important to note that these programs do not treat physicians but rather provide assessment and triage into care systems, and then carry out post-treatment monitoring. The ISMA’s Physician Assistance Program functions in this way.
The BMJ study concluded that about three-fourths of U.S. physicians with substance use disorders managed in physician health programs had favorable outcomes at five years. The data suggest that these programs, including the ISMA’s program, operate not only in the interest of the individual physician, but also in the interest of public safety.
The results showed that 95 percent of physicians who completed monitoring in the study were licensed and working as physicians five years later. This clinical data tell us why it is so important to extend a helping hand to our chemically dependent colleagues.
This research is important for physicians to understand who serve on hospital credentialing committees or executive committees as well as to non-medical committee members (administrators and attorneys) who may drift toward other less successful strategies.
There is ample evidence supporting intervention and medical treatment rather than the punitive pathway and anecdotal experience suggests punishment without rehabilitation actually brings opposite results, driving the problem further “underground.”
This not only serves the physician poorly, but also quite possibly decreases patient safety.
Labels: additions, physicians
posted by Anonymous at 5:46 AM
1 Comments:
If my brain surgeon is struggling with addiction problems, I would sure like to be aware of it. I would certainly wish him well in his effort, but I think I would want someone else doing the surgery.
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