National and state treatment need and capacity for opioid agonist medication-assisted treatment

C.M. Jones, M. Campopiano, G. Baldwin and E. McCance-Katz

American Journal of Public Health, 2015, vol. 105, issue 8, e55-e63

Abstract: Objectives. We estimated national and state trends in opioid agonist medication-assisted treatment (OA-MAT) need and capacity to identify gaps and inform policy decisions. Methods. We generated national and state rates of past-year opioid abuse or dependence, maximum potential buprenorphine treatment capacity, number of patients receiving methadone from opioid treatment programs (OTPs), and the percentage of OTPs operating at 80% capacity or more using Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration data. Results. Nationally, in 2012, the rate of opioid abuse or dependence was 891.8 per 100 000 people aged 12 years or older compared with national rates of maximum potential buprenorphine treatment capacity and patients receiving methadone in OTPs of, respectively, 420.3 and 119.9. Among states and the District of Columbia, 96% had opioid abuse or dependence rates higher than their buprenorphine treatment capacity rates; 37% had a gap of at least 5 per 1000 people. Thirty-eight states (77.6%) reported at least 75% of their OTPs were operating at 80% capacity or more. Conclusions. Significant gaps between treatment need and capacity exist at the state and national levels. Strategies to increase the number of OA-MAT providers are needed. © 2015, American Public Health Association Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: buprenorphine; methadone; narcotic analgesic agent, capacity building; health service; health survey; human; opiate substitution treatment; Opioid-Related Disorders; statistics and numerical data; United States, Analgesics, Opioid; Buprenorphine; Capacity Building; Health Services Needs and Demand; Health Surveys; Humans; Methadone; Opiate Substitution Treatment; Opioid-Related Disorders; United States (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (14)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.2105/AJPH.2015.302664

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2015.302664_4

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2015.302664

Access Statistics for this article

American Journal of Public Health is currently edited by Alfredo Morabia

More articles in American Journal of Public Health from American Public Health Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Christopher F Baum ().