Sustainability of Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment in Healthcare Settings

This report examines the post-grant experiences of clinics that implemented Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) under the Washington SBIRT-Primary Care Integration (WASBIRT-PCI) project. SBIRT is an evidence-based, universal public health approach to identify, prevent, and reduce substance use disorders. Project sites were asked to describe the barriers and facilitators to maintaining SBIRT at their healthcare facilities. Under WASBIRT-PCI, nineteen healthcare facilities implemented the SBIRT program and currently ten continue to offer the evidence-based practice with varying degrees of fidelity. Common barriers were staff turnover, insufficient support or “buy-in” for the program from staff and leadership, lack of funding to maintain program staff, limited training opportunities, insufficient reimbursement to deliver SBIRT, and lack of performance monitoring to ensure fidelity to the program.