Vanderbilt University Medical Center is starting a part-time addiction clinic so those who overdose on drugs have a place to go after leaving the emergency room.
WPLN-FM reports the "bridge clinic" is modeled after programs at other hospitals and will allow ER patients to move directly into a three-month outpatient treatment program, which will include medication to reduce drug cravings.
Addiction psychiatrist Dave Marcovitz says many times after overdose patients are revived and stabilized, they are either linked up with a local treatment center or given a phone number for one.
Vanderbilt's new clinic will start operating one day a week and to bridge the gap, Vanderbilt emergency physicians will start prescribing buprenorphine July 1.
Marcovitz says Vanderbilt wants to make "addiction care synonymous with medical care."
