Baptist Memorial Health Care and Integrated Addiction Care (IAC) Associates, a medical practice that treats patients with addictions to drugs and/or alcohol,recently won a $4 million, five-year Health Resources and Services Administration grant to expand their addiction medicine fellowship program.
Last fall, the two organizations joined forces to form the Center of Excellence in Addiction Medicine. The fellowship program is one component of the Center of Excellence, and it focuses on training future addiction medicine physicians. The grant will allow the center to train five physicians a year for five years, adding 25 addiction medicine specialists to the Mid-South community.
Baptist will host the program, and IAC will provide direction. It will have a strong collaboration with Meharry Medical College, one of the nation’s oldest and largest historically black academic health science centers. Program fellows will gain experience in inpatient, outpatient and telemedicine addiction care, and the program will emphasize service to underrepresented minority and under-served communities.
The Center of Excellence in Addiction Medicine gives patients at six Baptist Memorial hospitals – Baptist Memphis, Baptist Women’s Hospital, Baptist Collierville, Baptist Tipton, Baptist Carroll County and Baptist Union City – 24/7 access to addiction medicine specialists. It provides the same service to metro-Memphis Baptist Medical Group patients.
