Message from the Program Director

Sarah Abdelsayed.

Our program promotes inclusive harm reduction and strength-based approaches to treatment of people who use substances. You will develop collaborative relationships with your patients and help them to achieve their personalized goals. -Sarah Abdelsayed, MD

The UB Addiction Medicine Fellowship continues to evolve and innovate in both its curriculum training of fellows and treatment of patients. Our program remains a cornerstone of advocacy and education in the Western New York region and has roots dating back over a decade.

In 2011, the American Board of Addiction Medicine (ABAM) accredited the first 10 postgraduate programs in addiction medicine at institutions around the country.

Included in that groundbreaking group? 

UB.

Three years later, ABAM established the National Center for Physician Training in Addiction Medicine, charged with developing curricula and training primary care providers to specialize in the field.

Which university was chosen for its headquarters?

UB.

That’s one way of saying that you’ve come to a place that has been on the front line of meeting the challenges of recognizing the need, and providing care, for those suffering from the chronic disease of addiction. Our program is dedicated to training physicians who will provide non-stigmatizing, compassionate, evidence-based care to people who use substances. We educate our colleagues to do the same.

UB is raising the profile of — and training standards in — addiction medicine. Our individualized fellowship is leading the way, creating an unparalleled path for our fellows to become credentialed in this much-needed specialty.

Currently almost 60% of the population use one or more substances. People with substance use disorders (SUD) occupy up to 40% of all hospital beds and 65% of prison beds. However only 1 in 5 people impacted by SUD seeks treatment. Our program promotes inclusive harm reduction and strength-based approaches to treatment of people who use substances. You will develop collaborative relationships with your patients and help them to achieve their personalized goals.

Train at UB, within our large Department of Family Medicine, with multiple community partners and you will be exposed to a variety of evidence-based approaches. The fellowship’s focus is on fostering a learning environment that encourages compassion and critical thinking with the guidance of a diverse group of mentors in a variety of patient care settings. At UB, fellows are not  limited to a single training facility, but can hone their skills in clinical sites  which include a major academic hospitalresidential treatment programs,  a harm reduction center, criminal justice settings and outpatient behavioral health and SUD clinics. We are also associated with a robust research arm, the Primary Care Research Institute at UB, wherein fellows have opportunities to join ongoing research efforts in the field of SUD. Connect with a collaborative interdisciplinary research team that focuses on establishing trusting relationships with community partners and investigating patient-centered outcomes that matter.

Within this diverse learning environment, you’ll care for a broad patient base, one that includes adolescents, pregnant women and people who come from different walks of life, all sharing a common struggle.

Because we accept only two fellows into our program, you’ll receive individualized attention as you train. Our recent graduates come from multiple primary specialties including Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, Psychiatry, Emergency Medicine, Anesthesiology, Pathology, and Preventive Medicine. Rather than requiring you to conform to a one-size-fits-all curriculum, we tailor our curriculum to match your professional interests and goals.

As a result of this training approach, you’ll emerge from our program as not only a community expert in substance use disorders, but as a health care leader poised to train the next generation of addiction medicine physicians. What’s more, your expertise will position you to make system change — to impact research efforts, to shape health care practice and policy, to direct critical resources toward this devastating public health epidemic.

There’s no better time to launch your career in addiction medicine than right now — and no better place to train than right here.

If you have any questions about our program, please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Regards, 

Sarah Abdelsayed, MD
Program Director