Improving Physicians’ Self-Awareness and Attitudes Towards Patients with Substance Use Disorders via a Role-Playing Virtual Tool

Over the course of their careers, many physicians develop stigma toward patients with opioid use disorder (OUD) because of difficult clinical encounters and their lack of knowledge about the biological bases of addiction. For this project, physicians from Weill Cornell Medicine will collaborate with colleagues at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab and the Dalio Center for Health Justice at New York–Presbyterian to develop a virtual role-playing tool to assess physicians’ attitudes toward OUD patients and help them develop understanding and empathy toward these patients. The tool will then be piloted among a group of medical students.