ASAM Releases New Guidance Prioritizing Patient-Focused Addiction Treatment

The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) has released their 4th Edition of the ASAM Criteria. ASAM is a physician-led professional group for clinicians involved in the care of individuals living with a substance use disorder (SUD). ASAM publishes and updates the ASAM Criteria, which is a set of guidelines that establishes the standards for placement, continued service, and transfer of patients with addiction and co-occurring conditions. The 4th edition has a renewed focus on holistic and patient-centered care for treating SUD.

Some of the key changes include a focus on chronic care treatment, integrated care, treating co-occurring conditions, recovery support services, and harm reduction models. The most significant update, however, is the inclusion of a new dimension focusing on patient-centered considerations. This new 6th dimension for evaluation replaces the previous “readiness to change” dimension, which industry insiders said is now woven through every other dimension.

When ASAM first released the new guidelines in October, some confusion was expressed about the absence of partial hospitalization programs (PHPs) as a level of care listed. ASAM authors clarified that the guidelines did not eliminate PHPs, so much as tried to rename the service to high-intensity outpatient programs or HIOPs. The reasoning was to clarify the term since many PHP providers are not in a hospital.

Stakeholders from across the system can order a printed or digital copy of the latest version of the ASAM Criteria, 4th Edition on the American Society of Addiction Medicine’s website.