2022

How can I make Extended- Release Buprenorphine (XRB) accessible to my patients? Extended‑release buprenorphine (XRB) can improve treatment stability for people with opioid use disorder, but access is often complicated by insurance rules, billing pathways, and cost concerns. With some approaches, clinics can provide XRB with less cost to patients while keeping this service a […]

Deborah Hagler, MD, MPH, FAAP attended Duke University and Cornell Medical College and did her pediatric training at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Throughout her educational journey, she has been involved in collaborative efforts to educate her community. As a resident in Philadelphia, she worked with at-risk youth at a local homeless shelter and helped organize a series of talks for residents to educate herself and colleagues about social determinants of health. For these efforts receiving the Nancy Barnhart Community Service Award and the Senior Resident Humanitarian award. In 2021 she completed a Masters of Public Health at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University focusing on child and adolescent mental health and is using many of her new skills working with a multi stakeholder coalition to improve children’s mental health and spearheading the creation of additional resources to treat youth with substance misuse and substance use disorders through the TREATME NOW program at Day One.

Dr. Hagler is an active member of the community, serving as the school physician for many years and working with many local organizations on issues pertinent to children’s health and wellbeing.

She has been the recipient of several Community Builder Awards from the local United Way.
Dr. Hagler recently retired from her clinical practice at Maine Health Pediatrics Brunswick. She is a past President of the Maine Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics and remains on the AAP board as a co-chair of the Healthy Mental Development Committee. She is an active board member of the MidCoast Youth Center and, in 2024, was honored by the Maine Children’s Alliance with the Giraffe Award.

Why is medetomidine being combined with illicit opioids? Alpha-2 receptors in the central nervous system colocalize in the same areas of the brain as opioid receptors and when both receptor types are stimulated, their effects synergize. Alpha-2 agonists like medetomidine enhance the euphoric effects of opioids but without directly stimulating the opioid receptor. Chronic illicit

Dr. Alane O’Connor DNP is the Director of Perinatal Addiction Medicine at MaineHealth Maine Medical Center and served as the medical director of the Maine Maternal Opioid Misuse (MaineMOM) Initiative, a 5-year, $5 million federal grant to expand access to substance use treatment for pregnant and postpartum women. She has trained hundreds of resident physicians and fellows and is core faculty in Maine’s only addiction medicine fellowship. Dr. O’Connor has published more than a dozen peer-reviewed manuscripts on maternal and infant outcomes following treatment with medication for opioid use disorder during pregnancy as well as related postpartum healthcare utilization and health policy. , She developed a partnership with Portland Fire Department’s Mobile Medical Outreach (MMO) team after recognizing that some of her most at-risk pregnant women were not accessing health care in traditional settings. Project Lifeline is a nationally innovative medical and community paramedicine program that delivers street medicine services to unhoused pregnant and postpartum women with substance use disorder who live in tents, shelters, vehicles, and on the street.
Beyond caring for pregnant women, Dr. O’Connor works in the correctional system as the Director of Addiction Medicine at Somerset County Jail and Franklin County Detention Center and is the clinical advisor to the Maine Sheriffs’ Association. In this capacity, she developed and implemented a nationally innovative program using a monthly injectable medication (rather than a daily pill) to treat incarcerate individuals with opioid use disorder. The outcomes, published in Health & Justice, showed that the injectable medication expanded access to treatment during incarceration, improved treatment continuation after release and reduced the risk of post-release drug overdose death. The project gained nationwide attention and was featured on the front page of the New York Times and a related podcast.
Dr. O’Connor lectures regionally and nationally on substance use disorder to a variety of audiences including medical providers, the child welfare system, the correctional system and judiciary, as well as law enforcement. She is a member of the Maine Maternal Fetal and Infant Mortality Review Panel and co-chairs Maine’s Opioid Response Clinical Advisory Committee which advises the state’s opioid response director on clinical and public policy issues.

Kristina Beladi, FNP, started in 2017 as a community health primary care provider with a significant MOUD population, then transitioned to inpatient substance use treatment and outpatient private practice primary care. In 2023, she left primary care and began doing solely substance use treatment. She is currently the Medical Director at Avalon Counseling Services in