# Developing Implementation Strategies to Improve Access to Transitional Opioid Programs in Safety Net Hospitals

> **NIH NIH R34** · OHIO UNIVERSITY ATHENS · 2022 · $272,096

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract:
 Opioid use disorder (OUD) is a pressing public health problem nationwide but is increasing rapidly in
underserved communities where there is currently a shortage of services, particularly evidence-based
transitional opioid programs (TOPs) which link patients in hospitals to harm reduction and treatment resources.
Hospitals are ideal sites to address OUD and engage patients given the relationship between opioid use and
misuse and a number of acute health conditions, including overdose and infectious disease. Evidence
suggests that hospitals are highly motivated to participate in offering new interventions due to the economic
and social toll of untreated OUD. Safety net hospitals, however, face considerable barriers to adopting TOPs
and have been significantly less likely to offer OUD services in their communities. To engage safety-net
hospitals effectively and help them implement opioid programs such as TOPs, more information is needed on
implementation barriers to tailor implementation strategies that will be most effective given the local constraints
faced by safety-net providers.
 Using a combination of the latest publicly available community benefits reports and Internal Revenue
Service Schedule H data, we will catalog hospitals’ OUD services, including TOPs, and assess the relationship
between the adoption of TOP and various community and hospital characteristics, including safety-net status,
and examine trends in the availability of OUD services across time (Aim 1). We will then interview hospital
decision makers and community partners at five diverse safety net hospitals to better understand barriers and
facilitators to adopting and implementing TOPs. (Aim 2). Finally, we will convene an expert panel to identify
high-yield and tailored implementation strategies to increase the availability of transitional opioid programs and
other evidence-based opioid services in underserved communities (Aim 3). As an interdisciplinary team of
health services researchers, we have a strong record of collaborative publication and extramural funding
related to hospital-community partnerships and opioid services. The implementation strategies developed in
this study will lead to a future cluster randomized controlled trial to test the effectiveness of tailoring
implementation strategies to safety net settings. The long term outcome is to increase the availability of TOPs
in communities where significant disparities currently exist.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10526578
- **Project number:** 1R34DA055228-01A1
- **Recipient organization:** OHIO UNIVERSITY ATHENS
- **Principal Investigator:** Ji E Chang
- **Activity code:** R34 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2022
- **Award amount:** $272,096
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2022-08-01 → 2025-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10526578

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10526578, Developing Implementation Strategies to Improve Access to Transitional Opioid Programs in Safety Net Hospitals (1R34DA055228-01A1). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-06-01 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10526578. Licensed CC0.

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