PCSS webinar ‘Vaccines for Opioid Use Disorder: Focusing on the Fentanyl Epidemic’

To register, please visit: https://forum.issup.net/t/pcss-webinar-vaccines-for-opioid-use-disorder-focusing-on-the-fentanyl-epidemic/4161

Tuesday, May 28, 2019 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM EDT (Washington, DC time)

Target Audience: psychiatric clinicians (medical doctors, psychiatric nurses).

Fentanyl is the leading cause of opioid overdoses during the last couple of years, and these overdoses are not prevented by methadone, buprenorphine or naltrexone treatment. However, a vaccine against fentanyl has been able to block fentanyl’s analgesic, reinforcing and respiratory depressant effects in animal models. This vaccine is moving toward FDA approval to be tested in humans.

Educational objectives:

• Identify the extent and greatest geographic concentration of fentanyl overdoses and abuse in the current USA opioid epidemic.
• Define how and why current treatments with naltrexone, methadone and buprenorphine are ineffective for fentanyl abuse.
• Identify the mechanism of action for fentanyl vaccines in preventing overdoses and abuse through the production of anti-fentanyl antibodies.

Presenter(s): 

Thomas R. Kosten, MD, Waggoner Professor in Psychiatry, Pharmacology, Neuroscience, Baylor College of Medicine;

Fang Yang, MD, PhD, Addiction Psychiatry Fellow, Baylor College of Medicine

Funding for this initiative was made possible (in part) by grant no. 5U79TI026556-03 from SAMHSA. The views expressed in written conference materials or publications and by speakers and moderators do not necessarily reflect the official policies of the Department of Health and Human Services; nor does mention of trade names, commercial practices, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.