Exploring Barriers and Facilitators in Adopting Medication-Assisted Treatment

Medication-assisted treatment (MAT), a combined use of approved medications, counseling, and behavioral therapies, is being adopted by states with high rates of opioid use in rural communities. Unfortunately, at the time of project creation, the availability of MAT in rural southern Indiana communities was practically non-existent. Guided by the input from community key informants, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 50 medical, public health, social service, and mental health care providers practicing in Orange, Lawrence, Washington, Jennings, Scott, Harrison, and Gibson counties. Findings were be presented to System of Care coalitions, thus leading to the development of county specific policies, system change, and environmental strategies of MAT to mitigate opioid addiction.