Preventive medicine
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Preventive medicine · Nov 2023
Lessons learned from statewide contingency management rollouts addressing stimulant use in the Northwestern United States.
Increases in stimulant drug use (such as methamphetamine) and related deaths creates an imperative for community settings to adopt evidence-based practices to help people who use stimulants. Contingency management (CM) is a behavioral intervention with decades of research demonstrating efficacy for the treatment of stimulant use disorder, but real-world adoption has been slow, due to well-known implementation barriers, including difficulty funding reinforcers, and stigma. This paper describes the training and technical assistance (TTA) efforts and lessons learned for two state-wide stimulant-focused CM implementation projects in the Northwestern United States (Montana and Washington). ⋯ Seventeen of these sites, ten of eleven in Montana (90.9%) and seven of 24 in Washington (29.2%), went on to implement contingency management programs adherent to their state's established CM protocol and received ongoing TTA in the form of implementation coaching calls. These findings illustrate that site-specific barriers such as logistical fit precluded implementation in more than 50% of the trained sites; however, strategies for site-specific tailoring within the required protocol aided implementation, resulting in successful CM program launch in a diverse cross-section of service sites across the states. The lessons learned add to the body of literature describing CM implementation barriers and solutions.
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Preventive medicine · Nov 2023
The urgent need for contingency management among tribal communities in the United States: Considerations for implementation, policy, and sovereignty.
In two randomized controlled trials, culturally adapted contingency management (i.e., incentives provided for substance-negative urine samples) was associated with reduced alcohol and drug use among geographically diverse American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) adults. In response to interest in contingency management from other Tribal and AI/AN communities, our research team in collaboration with AI/AN behavioral health experts, translated the research into practice with new AI/AN community partners. Tenets of community-based participatory research were applied to develop, pilot, and refine contingency management training and implementation tools, and identify implementation challenges. ⋯ Adoption of contingency management is feasible and can strengthen Tribal communities' capacity to deliver evidence-based substance use disorder treatments to AI/AN people. Unfortunately, non-evidence-based limits to the use of federal funding for contingency management incentives discriminate against AI/AN communities. We recommend specific federal policy reforms, as well as other practical solutions for Tribal communities interested in contingency management.
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Preventive medicine · Nov 2023
US state laws relevant to incentives for health behavior: A qualitative analysis.
Contingency management (CM) involves provision of incentives for positive health behaviors via a well-defined protocol and is among the most effective treatments for patients with substance use disorders (SUDs). An understanding of laws affecting incentives for health behaviors and outcomes, including contexts in which incentives are already permitted, could inform efforts to disseminate CM. We conducted a systematic NexisUni legal database review of state statutes and regulations effective during 2022 to identify (a) laws that explicitly permit or prohibit delivery of incentives to patients, employees, or insurance beneficiaries for SUD-specific behaviors or outcomes, and (b) laws that explicitly permit delivery of incentives for any health behaviors or outcomes. ⋯ More broadly, we identified 57 laws across 29 jurisdictions permitting incentives for any health outcomes (both SUD- and non-SUD-related). These laws occurred in the contexts of wellness programs, K-12/early childhood education, government public health promotion, and SUD treatment provider licensing. Considering the urgent need to expand evidence-based SUD treatment in rural and underserved areas throughout the US, these findings could inform efforts to develop laws explicitly permitting provision of incentives in SUD care and enhance efforts to disseminate CM more broadly.
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Preventive medicine · Nov 2023
EditorialBehavior change, health, and health disparities 2023: Contingency management for treating substance use disorders and promoting health in vulnerable populations.
This Special Issue (SI) of Preventive Medicine is the 10th in a series on behavior change, health, and health disparities. This issue focuses on Contingency Management (CM), a highly efficacious behavior-change intervention for substance use disorders (SUDs) and other behavioral health conditions wherein patients receive material incentives (e.g., vouchers exchangeable for retail items) contingent on objectively verified behavior change. ⋯ This is especially concerning regarding stimulant use disorder for which CM is the only reliably efficacious intervention in controlled studies and yet is unavailable to the vast majority of those in need. This SI details recent promising developments in efforts to surmount longstanding implementation obstacles while also detailing other promising advances from meta-analyses and controlled trials examining CM's efficacy in treating other difficult-to-treat problems including smoking among pregnant women and mothers of young children as well among those as those experiencing homelessness and alcohol use disorder, the promise of digital CM, and a potential new application in promoting adherence with SUD medications.
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Preventive medicine · Nov 2023
Randomized Controlled TrialAbstinence-contingent wage supplements for adults experiencing homelessness and alcohol use disorder: A randomized clinical trial.
This study evaluated the effectiveness of abstinence-contingent wage supplements in promoting alcohol abstinence and employment in adults experiencing homelessness and alcohol use disorder. A randomized clinical trial was conducted from 2019 to 2022. After a 1-month Induction period, 119 participants were randomly assigned to a Usual Care Control group (n = 57) or an Abstinence-Contingent Wage Supplement group (n = 62). ⋯ Abstinence-Contingent Wage Supplement participants were also significantly more likely to obtain employment (51.3% vs. 31.6% of months, OR = 2.6, 95% CI 1.5 to 4.4, p < .001) and live out of poverty (38.2% vs. 16.7% of months, OR = 3.7, 95% CI 2.0 to 7.1, p < .001) than Usual Care participants. These findings suggest that Abstinence-Contingent Wage Supplements can promote alcohol abstinence and employment in adults experiencing homelessness and alcohol use disorder. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03519009.