Two-fifths of college students in the United states meet the criteria for substance use disorder. Young adults are also at an increased his for having an opioid use disorder (OUD). The current study recruited undergraduate students to look at their perceived knowledge of and attitudes towards Medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD).
To complete the study, participants were asked to report their knowledge of and perceived helpfulness of methadone, oral buprenorphine, and extended-release naltrexone for treating OUD. They also asked about perceived helpfulness of non-MOUD treatment methods including peer support groups, individual counseling, group counseling, outpatient treatment, residential treatment, and inpatient treatment. Knowledge of these treatments were assessed by asking participants if they have every heard of the treatment, are somewhat knowledgeable, or very knowledge. They asked students to mark any treatment they or someone they are close to has participated in.
1,280 total respondents were included in this study. 27% of them were from a large Midwestern public university and 73% came from a large Southeastern public university. 45% of the total respondents were freshman and 39% were male. Between 33.5%-45.2% of the respondents were very knowledgeable about non-MOUD treatment methods. 4.4% were very knowledgeable about methadone, 3.8% about extended-release naltrexone, and 3.4% for oral/sublingual buprenorphine. Majority of participants believed non-MOUD treatments were either helpful or very helpful. Less than 14% of the students thought any of the three MOUD were helpful. These findings show students may not be as educated on MOUD and campuses may benefit from providing education on it to students.
Take Away: The current study recruited undergraduate students to look at their perceived knowledge of and attitudes towards Medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD). Participants were asked to report knowledge of and perceived helpfulness of methadone, oral buprenorphine, and extended-release naltrexone for treating OUD. They also asked about perceived helpfulness of non-MOUD treatment methods. 1,280 total respondents were included in this study. 33.5%-45.2% of the respondents were very knowledgeable about non-MOUD treatment methods. 3.4%-4.4% were very knowledgeable about MOUD treatment methods. Majority of participants believed non-MOUD treatments were helpful. Only less than 14% of the students thought that any of the three MOUD were helpful. Campuses may benefit from providing more education on MOUD to students.