CIPC Blog

Is practicing the spirit of Motivational Interviewing enough?  Implications for MI teachers and students

Read more about what actually produces skilled MI practitioners in this post by CIPC Director, Dr. Daniel Mullin.  Dan has been teaching and practicing Motivational Interviewing for more than 20 years and he discusses data about MI training and his observations about how MI is used in real clinical situations.  Click on the title to read the post.

CIPC Director, Dan Mullin PsyD, MPH reflects on his role as a behavioral health practitioner in a clinic where Medication Assisted Treatment and Medications for Opioid Use Disorder (MAT/MOUD) are common.  His clinical work is as a BHP in a rural clinic that has a substantial population of individuals and families impacted by substance use.  

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Might common and widespread practices surrounding Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) for Opioid Use Disorder (OUD) actually be harming patients? Steve Martin, MD, EdM, is lead author on a paper recently published in the Annals of Internal Medicine that examines the evidence.  The findings in the article will form the backbone of a course that will be given to all Massachusetts medical school students.  UMass CIPC is leading the team that will build this critical training.

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The opioid epidemic inflicts significant human and economic damage in the United States. A July article in the New England Journal of Medicine by Drs. Sarah Wakeman and Michael Barnett provides a helpful summary of the myths and realities associated with buprenorphine (Suboxone) and the opioid epidemic.

The UMass Center for Integrated Primary Care continues to play an active role in training primary care teams to respond to the needs of patients with Opioid Use Disorder.

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It is logical to ask if Motivational Interviewing can be an effective intervention for patients struggling with issues of weight and obesity.  As with any chronic health condition, MI can be helpful, but it is not a cure.  The question to ask is, “What is the target?”

Primary care is an appropriate setting for managing many chronic conditions.  Its longitudinal practice of medicine may seem ideal to handle this intractable issue.  But modern PC practices are also fast-paced and mostly limited to brief encounters.  Obesity cannot be cured in a fifteen-minute consult.  

Self-care and mindfulness techniques help patients cope with lives that leave them exhausted and burnt out. 

PCPs might model that self-care in their own struggles to stay afloat in a punishing healthcare system.

When you want to help your patients change you must listen with empathic understanding and acceptance. Sound interesting? This is from Bill Miller’s—one of the founders of Motivational Interviewing-- recent presentation at the International Conference on Motivational Interviewing. CIPC Director, Daniel Mullin, regularly attends and presents at these international conferences, which are attended by a mix of educators, researchers, and consultants. Read more >