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The 2017 MetaECHO Conference in Albuquerque, NM brings together health policy experts, government officials, academic leaders, funders, and Project ECHO replication partners from across the globe. All conference goers share the collective goal of touching one billion lives by 2025. The four-day conference embraces the infinite possibilities of the global ECHO movement across healthcare and beyond.

Danna Gobel, LCSW, Clinic Coordinator and Co-Facilitator of the Boston Medical Center Opioid Addiction Treatment Hub for primary care teams attended the conference September 13-16, 2017. Danna and team submitted an abstract which was accepted as a poster presentation titled, “Challenges identified by primary care teams implementing addiction treatment into office based settings: Boston Medical Center’s (BMC) Opioid Addiction Treatment ECHO” and which won the Judge’s Award for Research at the MetaECHO 2017 Poster Session.

Danna and team performed a quality improvement project that utilized thematic analysis to identify patterns in challenges faced by primary care teams implementing addiction treatment programs as indicated on the first 30 case presentation forms completed by the BMC Opioid ECHO participants (Spokes). Challenges identified were categorized into 4 main groups:

1. patient engagement strategies (e.g., how to engage ambivalent patients)
2. medication management (e.g., how to initiate or discontinue use of buprenorphine)
3. managing medical/psychiatric comorbidities (e.g., managing patients who are co-prescribed psychiatric medications)
4. substance use in patient adherent to buprenorphine program (e.g., buprenorphine successfully treating OUD but patient also using cocaine).

Future research should look at themes in a larger, more diverse sample to help inform future ECHO projects and ensure that Hub curricula remains topical and relevant.

Congratulations Danna and team!