Stony Brook’’s new SBIRT Program Honored for its Innovativeness
On November 1, 2016, at the annual Achievements in Health Care awards ceremony hosted by Long Island Business News at Crest Hollow Country Club in Woodbury, Stony Brook received 16 awards, more honors than any other hospital on Long Island.
One of the 16 awards went to Stony Brook’s new SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment) program for the “Innovations in Health Care,” category. This award honors a company, organization or group of individuals responsible for the development of a new procedure, treatment or service that can save lives or improve quality of life.
The SBIRT screening program for substance abuse is an approach to population health that enables clinicians to educate our patients about how alcohol or drug use may be impacting their overall well-being. It also helps to ensure that patients with substance abuse difficulties are connected to the appropriate community resources at the time of discharge, beyond simply providing information about where they can seek services. SBIRT can reduce emergency room visits, reduce readmission rates, improve public health over time, address/treat the “whole” person, improve family outcomes and improve patient/family satisfaction. The Emergency Department at Stony Brook University Hospital went live with SBIRT in February 2016.
On-boarding and training of the ED staff at Stony Brook University Hospital is complete and the program is being rolled out in Stony Brook’s primary care settings, such as Family Medicine, throughout 2016.
Stony Brook was the first hospital to implement such a program as a distinct initiative of the DSRIP (Delivery System Reform Incentive Payment Program) in Suffolk County, leading the charge by collaborating with all 11 other hospitals in Suffolk County. In fact, Suffolk is the only county in the state implementing SBIRT as a stand-alone DSRIP project, on which the Suffolk County DSRIP network achieved an application score of 100 points out of a possible 100 points.
For the complete list of winners from Stony Brook Medicine, click here