Radiology, psychiatry researchers collaborate to study opioid use disorders
Researchers from the fields of psychiatry and radiology at Penn Medicine in Philadelphia are working together to launch the Penn PET Addiction Center of Excellence (PACE).
Funded by a five-year, $8.9 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, Penn PACE will be the first facility of its kind to focus on using PET imaging to learn more about opioid use disorders. Yale University’s PET Center will also play a crucial role in the center, helping Penn Medicine’s team seek out new treatments for these harmful disorders.
Patients seeking treatment from a variety of healthcare providers will be directed to the center, where they will take part in clinical studies.
“There is a clear and growing need for improved treatment options for patients with opioid use disorder,” Henry Kranzler, MD, a professor of psychiatry in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and co-principal investigator of Penn PACE, said in a prepared statement. “With this new center, researchers from radiology, psychiatry, and addiction science will come together to employ innovative PET approaches that can yield new insights into key neural mechanisms underlying these disorders. Our hope is that these discoveries can lead to new, more precise treatments that save lives.”
“Penn PACE will take advantage of the unique resources from all angles in this new effort to better understand opioid use disorders and the patients battling them,” Robert H. Mach, PhD, a professor of radiology and director of the radiochemistry program at the University of Pennsylvania and co-principal investigator of Penn Pace, said in the same statement.
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