Rapid Access Addiction Medicine Clinic

Our Rapid Access Addiction Medicine clinic sees patients seeking help related to their substance or alcohol use with no referral or appointment required.

Clinic times: Wednesday afternoons 2 - 4 pm (as of February 7, 2018)
Location: B-Wing, 6th floor, room B6 34

At the clinic, the addiction clinical team immediately provides counselling, prescribes appropriate addiction medications (such as buprenorphine, naltrexone, or acamprosate), and connects patients to community treatment programs.

Once patients are stabilized, they are referred back to primary care for long-term follow-up. The clinical team provides ongoing support by being available to family physicians for re-assessments, consultations, and advice about addiction care.

In this model, addiction specialists, hospital staff, family doctors, and community service agents work together to provide seamless and accessible care to patients with substance use disorders.

This clinic is part of a new network of addictions medicine clinics across the City of Toronto and will be Sunnybrook’s first addictions-specific service.

Services available

• Assessment of substance use concerns and review of treatment option
• Brief individual counseling and psychotherapy
• Management of acute alcohol and opioid withdrawal
• Outpatient tapering of patients on opioids or benzodiazepines
• Medication assisted treatment for alcohol, opioid and cannabis use disorders
• Education on overdose prevention and use of naloxone
• Referral to community supports and treatment programs
• Reintegration support for patients who have completed residential treatment

Our team of specialists is also available to support primary care physicians

• Training and education to help physicians manage patients with addictions
• Individual advice and support regarding the management of patients on opioids for chronic pain, including opioid tapering and buprenorphine or methadone treatment
• Advice and support regarding the management of patients with alcohol use disorder
• Support and shared care with the patient’s primary care physician
• Telemedicine consultations
• Timely physician-to-physician phone or e-mail consultation

For more information about the clinic, please contact: Lori Lucier or Arachel Abella arachel.abella@sunnybrook.ca.