Departments in the Communities Highlight: Sinai Hospital Addictions Recovery Program (SHARP)

Sinai Hospital Addictions Recovery Program (SHARP) is an opioid treatment program that has been serving the residents in the area surrounding Sinai Hospital since 1970. In addition to medications for treating opioid use disorder, SHARP provides outpatient individual, group, and family counseling, hepatitis C treatment, psychiatric treatment including medication management, case management including referrals for medical care, vocational rehabilitation, parenting classes, housing assistance, insurance assistance, utility assistance, legal assistance, and education about substance use, psychiatric and medical disorders. For over 50 years now, SHARP's dedicated team of staff members have given patients a safe environment, free from judgement, where they can begin to rebuild their lives while meeting others who are struggling with the same problems.  

SHARP also provides community outreach by attending resource fairs to educate attendees about substance use and psychiatric disorders as well as SHARP's services. Since 2014, SHARP has been working with other community partners such as St. Gregory's church to provide Thanksgiving food baskets to SHARP patients in need of assistance during the holidays. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many of the outreach fairs were cancelled but we were still able to team up with St. Gregory's and Our Daily Bread to increase the number of food baskets given to patients from 36 in 2019 to 65 in 2020.  
 

COVID has changed SHARP's daily operations in many ways. Federal guidelines that govern opioid treatment programs have been temporarily relaxed due to the ongoing public health crisis, which has allowed SHARP to give more take-home medication than usual and to conduct counseling sessions via telehealth. Both of these mitigation strategies have likely reduced the spread of the virus among our medically vulnerable population and quite possibly saved lives by allowing for "social distancing." However, it has also decreased the therapeutic contact patients have with their peers and with program staff, lessening the support that patients rely on to deal with the symptoms of their disorders.  
 

At no point during the COVID-19 pandemic has SHARP closed its doors to our patients. While we were able to obtain cameras and speakers from IS to provide telehealth services and we've been able to offer some "virtual" therapy and education groups, many SHARP clients lack the stability, the technological know-how, or the equipment to participate in telehealth. Therefore, we have continued in-person individual counseling sessions while using appropriate PPE and physical distancing for those clients who are unable to use telehealth. Likewise, we have continued to admit new patients, uninterrupted throughout the past year, in order to assist community members plagued by another deadly ongoing public health crisis, the opioid epidemic. 
 

Before we discuss how LifeBridge Health departments can be of assistance, we first want to acknowledge some of the departments and individuals in LifeBridge Health who help us provide the highest quality services possible not only during the pandemic but before. Thank you to EVS, facilities, maintenance, security, IS, and all other department that keep our facility safe and running every day. Thank you to Jai Beecy who made sure that we had COVID screeners and PPE throughout the pandemic. Thank you to infection control for advising us on the best way to keep everyone safe. Thank you, Julie Sampson and the rest of the accreditation team who worked with us to assure that we made it through our virtual TJC survey in October. Thank you to our departmental administrators, Dawn Hurley, Dr. Pate, and Dr. Poffenroth who ensure that we have the resources and support to meet our patients' needs. Finally, thank you to the SBIRT teams at LifeBridge Health, especially those in Sinai and Northwest's EDs, Sinai's OB department, and all other areas of the hospital who make referrals to SHARP. 
 

The most important way other departments can be of assistance is to refer patients to SHARP who need treatment for opioid use disorder. SHARP receives very few referrals from Sinai and other LBH facilities. Another way to help is by simply treating patients with behavioral health disorders with respect. Too often, SHARP patients and others with substance use and mental health disorders are met with judgment and disapproval when they seek medical treatment, sometimes even at LBH facilities. Sadly, this often results in patients giving up hope, abandoning their efforts to seek treatment, or opting out of routine health care that could likely prevent a medical crisis later. No one chooses to have a substance use disorder and treatment works.