Increasing the Knowledge of Opioid Use Disorder and Medication Assisted Treatment for Advanced Practice Registered Nurses in Georgia

The national opioid crisis has had devastating effects on the United States (US) healthcare system with the financial burden totaling more than $2 trillion from 2015 to 2018 (White House Government, 2020) and the physical burden of 128 overdose-related deaths daily (Centers for Disease Control, 2020). According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), some of these deaths result from deficits in education of healthcare providers about pain management treatment (CDC, 2020). Improved education for healthcare providers has resulted in a significant decline in the total number of opioid prescriptions from 2016 to 2019, which suggests that successful containment of the opioid epidemic begins with the prescriber (White House Government, 2020). This paper will describe an online training module’s effectiveness in educating Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRNs) about medications used to treat opioid use disorder (OUD)