Addiction treatment provider Symetria Health is combating the opioid epidemic through its innovative comprehensive, integrated model of all available evidence-based medication assisted treatment and outpatient behavioral therapy in order to meet patients where they are at in the recovery journey.
CHICAGO, March 22, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Addiction treatment provider Symetria Health is combating the opioid epidemic through its innovative comprehensive, integrated model of all available evidence-based medication assisted treatment and outpatient behavioral therapy in order to meet patients where they are at in the recovery journey. As most opioid patients don’t respond nor score on the ASAM assessment to require residential care, the Symetria Method, focuses on intensive outpatient therapy and incorporating medication assisted treatment, rather than solely offering behavioral therapies as many treatment centers do or prescribing craving blocking medications without supportive services.
As a result of seeing “treatment as usual” fail patients and the opioid epidemic consume the country, three visionary treatment professionals joined together to create the most effective treatment program to reverse the tide. Chris Hassan, CEO whose experience included co-founder of Reckitt Benckiser Pharmaceuticals Inc as well as developmental work on depot naltrexone and CEO of the nation’s second largest provider of opioid treatment, Colonial Management Group. While working on patenting technology to prevent diversion and abuse of opioids, Hassan launched the process that would result in acquiring a small treatment clinic in Chicago to launch Symetria. Tim Bohman joined Symetria as COO and help scale the organization as he had done for 20 years with the largest provider of opioid care in the country- Acadia/CRC. The final piece to the leadership team was the addition of Martyn Gibson, former senior leader at Reckitt Benckiser Pharmaceuticals Inc (now Indivior plc) who held multiple finance and strategic positions latterly as Global Strategic Planning and Analytics Director. All three industry leaders agree that treatment must be comprehensive, effective and scalable to be able impact the national epidemic. Thus, Symetria was born
Symetria has proven to be superior to conventional treatment as illustrated by:
- Decrease in opiate use over thirteen fold greater than published studies of buprenorphine prescribing
- Significant decrease in hospitalization for patients in treatment at Symetria
- Significant decrease in emergency room visits for patients in treatment
- Drug screen results at six months ten fold superior than published studies showing superior outcomes for patients seeking treatment with Symetria
These results are driven in large part by a treatment combining medical, psychiatric and behavioral health professionals working together as a unified treatment team.
“As one of the founders of the organization that launched Suboxone in 2003, I have seen the opioid abuse market change and grow while the treatment models remain the same. Rather than blame the patients for their struggles, we decided to change the treatment to serve patients seeking effective care to support their efforts. Symetria used the extensive experiences of the leadership team in combination with all the data and evidence in the field of addiction that the Surgeon General had curated as effective. A model that deployed those principles as accessible and cost effective was born-,” said Symetria CEO Chris Hassan. “The meaning behind better outcomes is lives saved, families re-united, children returned home, and suffering and devastation reduced.”
In 2016, the Surgeon General’s Report on Alcohol, Drugs, and Health stated that in order for treatment to be effective, it must care for various unique needs of the individual and not just his or her drug addiction. Most importantly it concluded that three medications- methadone, buprenorphine and/or naltrexone, combined with cognitive behavioral therapy, individual and group counseling, is highly effective as a treatment modality to bring a patient from full blown chronic opioid addiction to recovery. Shockingly, according to SAMSHA research data from 2016, only 2.7% of more than 12,000 addiction treatment providers nationwide offer the three currently approved evidenced based medications used in the treatment of opioid use disorder. Symetria clinics offer all three medications with treatment experts working with patients to determine which medications will work best for that individual at that point in their treatment combined with behavioral therapy in an outpatient setting. Symetria not only offers a customized treatment plan based on this accepted standard, its systemic approach is showing superior and encouraging outcomes for patients to achieve a successful remission and recovery from their opioid addiction.
“For years patients have had to pick from a menu of addiction treatment providers with different philosophies and approaches to treating the symptoms of addition. Additional services including mental health or medication that are needed are referred to outside providers with little coordination of care. This fragmentation of treatment has resulted with the patient being bounced between providers as they look to control their disease in a burdensome and overly complex system,” stated Tim Bohman, Symetria COO.
Symetria’s long term outpatient program gives patients the intense treatment necessary from stabilization to daily or weekly outpatient care and post program relapse prevention. Symetria has refined and developed the Symetria Method which is a treatment program that brings all outpatient care modalities delivered by one team of opioid specialists. The Symetria Method is the clinical gold standard that shows how to convene a multi-disciplinary team and devise a treatment plan for a patient suffering from opioid addiction using all forms of behavioral therapy and any of the three proven craving reduction medications if necessary. Additionally, the integration of psychiatric services in this care team elevates the outcomes for patients as research shows that 70% of opioid patients have comorbid psychiatric illnesses that trigger addiction relapse when untreated.
