ChristianaCare’s peer specialists bridge the gap between crisis care and substance use treatment

Someone struggling with substance use disorder may not know how or where to ask for help. Since 2008, Project Engage from ChristianaCare in Wilmington, Del., has brought help to them. The early intervention and referral program uses Engagement Specialists who collaborate with hospital staff to identify patients who may need help and connect them to local resources. The Engagement Specialists have a very particular set of skills: they are in recovery themselves.

Project Engage began with a single Engagement Specialist, a role also known as a peer in recovery. The program expanded to Christiana Hospital in 2011 and to the emergency departments at both the Christiana and Wilmington hospitals in 2013. In 2023, ChristianaCare formally partnered with the Cecil County, Md., Health Department to bring Engagement Specialists to ChristianaCare’s Union Hospital in Elkton, Md. In 2024 the program assisted over 600 patients, 440 of whom were connected to long-term recovery treatments.

“We’re able to address their substance abuse concerns and tie it all into their visit here in the Emergency Department,” said Emily Granitto, M.D., an emergency room physician with ChristianaCare. “That opportunity may not necessarily arise otherwise in the community — so offering it here and providing that olive branch can be a good bridge to the next step,” she said.

Union Hospital has 10 trained peer specialists in the ED. Each of them has undergone 500 hours of training, plus 25 hours of supervised practice. Their most valuable asset, though, is having been in a situation similar to the patient’s — and finding their way to sobriety.