About HOMER

Medication-assisted treatment (MAT) with buprenorphine begins with a step called induction. For the induction to be effective, the person with opioid use disorder must be in active withdrawal. If not, the treatment can lead to serious side effects.

To date, the standard care was for doctors to see the person at the practice during induction.  However, one of the difficulties is timing withdrawal to coincide with office hours and ensure office space is available.

The HOMER team will compare standard office induction with induction that occurs at home, either through telehealth or just with office support.

The study is a randomized, parallel group, three-arm pragmatic comparative effectiveness trial of three models for induction:

• home induction (asynchronous, unobserved)
• office induction (synchronous, observed)
• telehealth induction (synchronous phone or video contact, observed)

Funding (nearly $4.8 million) from PCORI will support the trial, which goes through August, 2024. HOMER is led by the Department of Family Medicine’s Linda Zittleman, MSPH, senior instructor, and Don Nease, MD, professor and vice chair for community.

Photo Credits

Doug Miller, Rocky Ford, Colorado