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Arizona MD Creates mHealth App for Pregnant Women Dealing With SUD

A University of Arizona Doctor is using a $10,000 HRSA prize to fine-tune an mHealth platform designed for people dealing with substance abuse to help pregnant women and new mothers.

Source: ThinkStock

By Eric Wicklund

- A University of Arizona physician is modifying an mHealth platform to give new and expecting mothers a digital health connection to substance abuse treatment.

Maria Manriquez, MD, director of the Addiction Medicine curriculum and professor in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Arizona College of Medicine-Phoenix, is using a $10,000 prize from the US Health Resources and Service Administration to modify the connected care platform developed by iTether Technologies, a Phoenix-based telehealth company.

iTether had developed the mHealth app for people dealing with substance abuse disorder (SUD). Manriquez’ goal is to personalize that app for pregnant women and new mothers.

“Pregnant and parenting women who are in the process of recovery have so many issues to deal with,” she said in a recent press release issued by UA. “Even with coordinated care, such as medical homes, a huge gap exists. This is especially prevalent when part of the 'prescription' includes medication, obstetric and addiction medicine visits, counseling, support groups and learning new material such as cognitive behavioral therapy techniques.”

The iTether platform is part of a wave of mHealth and telehealth services aimed at expanding access to care for people dealing with SUD, which kills an estimated 115 people a day in the US. The malleable nature of an mHealth solution enables healthcare providers like Manriquez to tailor that service to a specific population.

“Often, patients have transportation or child care limits that restrict reliable and quality care. It is not easy as a full-time parent, employee or student to make and keep appointments, especially when there is no coordination in timing of visits for someone with a chronic disorder,” she said. “The prototype could benefit the community by setting guidelines and developing standards that help providers deliver consistent messaging to patients.”

Working with iTether, Manriquez was named one of 10 first round winners in a Grand Challenge developed by the HRSA’s Maternal and Child Health Bureau to tackle opioid use disorder in pregnant women and new mothers. The team is using the $10,000 prize to enhance the app and launch a trial through August 2019.

"Care coordination and management, especially for pregnant women with substance-use disorder in rural communities, is essential to effective treatment and support," Karen Burstein, PhD, iTether’s Chief Clinical Officer, said in the press release. "Patient-centered care coordination originally was developed to improve the health outcomes of individuals with chronic conditions and/or multi-system involvement that frequently required interdisciplinary care. We are proposing to adapt the iTether care management system for use with both English- and Spanish-speaking women with substance use disorder and release it on a limited basis to patients under the care of Dr. Manriquez and her colleagues."

This isn’t the only connected health project undertaken by Manriquez.

She’s also using a $700,000 grant received September 2018 from the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS) to launch a clinic for pregnant and parenting women with substance use disorder at Banner Health’s University Medicine Women's Institute in Phoenix. That clinic will include a telemedicine platform to help mentor and educate rural and remote care providers.

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