Our Mission
Family and Community Medicine's mission in addiction medicine is to provide comprehensive, evidence-based, and integrated care for families impacted by substance use and train healthcare professionals to offer such support. We strive to be stigma-free and trauma-informed in our work, creating welcoming healthcare environments and interactions with the communities we serve.
Dedicated Faculty
Associate Professor
Medical Director, InSight SBIRT Services – Harris Health
Medical Director, I-CARE Clinic – Santa Maria Hostel
Medical Director, Sobering Center – Houston Recovery Center
Instructor
Provider of Integrated Primary Care, I-CARE Clinic – Santa Maria Hostel
Associate Professor
Director of Behavioral Health
Associate Professor
Director of Research
Assistant Professor
Provider of Integrated Primary Care, I-CARE Clinic – Santa Maria Hostel
Richard M. Kleberg, Sr. Professor & Chair
Service Sites
Our faculty provides services and administrative leadership in partnership with a number of community-based prevention and treatment programs for substance use disorders, and organizations focused on serving under-resourced and historically marginalized communities in the Greater Houston area.
Santa Maria Hostel is the largest substance use disorder treatment center in Texas that specializes in services for under-resourced women with children. Santa Maria offers a full spectrum of services, including prevention programs with area school districts and community organizations, street outreach, jail in reach, residential and intensive outpatient treatment, recovery housing, and long-term recovery support. Over 90 percent of clients served are uninsured with inadequate resources and current and/or prior experiences of trauma. Santa Maria provides services to over 10,000 women and their families annually.
Santa Maria's I-CARE Clinic is a collaborative initiative with Family and Community Medicine. The integrated clinic attends to the needs of women seeking treatment for their substance use disorders, mental health, and physical well-being. The clinic makes essential services available at no cost to underserved families. As a safe space for patients, the clinic focuses on compassionate care in recovery for the whole family.
Santa Maria has a medically managed withdrawal unit where women can undergo detoxification in a secure environment. This program is accessible at all hours and supervised by Baylor College of Medicine physicians and Santa Maria nurses. Residential and outpatient treatment options are available to clients after detoxification.
Houston Recovery Center is a facility open to anyone in need of guidance to recover from the effects of substance use. HRC operates the first and only sobering center in the Houston Metro area, providing a medically safe setting for individuals to regain sobriety. The facility offers jail diversion for those picked up by local law enforcement due to public intoxication. Rather than going to jail, this intervention allows people to get the help they need to sober and engage in long term recovery support. HRC's sobering center also receives clients from local hospital emergency centers.
At HRC, Family and Community Medicine provides policies and procedures to ensure effective, safe sobering practices and staff training for the facility. We are dedicated to the mission of HRC and its impact on the community.
For over two decades, Family and Community Medicine has been in partnership with Harris Health to provide screening, brief intervention, referral, and treatment (SBIRT) services to Harris Health patients through the InSight program. Dedicated SBIRT specialists staffed at Ben Taub General Hospital and Lyndon B. Johnson Hospital provide SBIRT services at bedside. The InSight Clinic, located in the Ben Taub Pavilion, provides ambulatory addiction medicine services to patients referred from Harris Health's community health centers and specialty care clinics.
Service Grants
We are involved in many grants centered on substance use disorders and community health. Several federal agencies sponsor our initiatives with collaborators. Visit our Research Grant Funding page for more information on each active grant.
| Grant Name | Funding Agency | Faculty Roles |
| EmpowHER | SAMHSA | Zoorob, PD |
| MIRRORS+ (Maternal Initiative for Reflective Recovery-Oriented Residential Services Plus) | SAMHSA – SMH | Kowalchuk, Subaward PI (Bell, PI) |
| Access to Care | SAMHSA – BHSST | Gonzalez, Subaward PD (Martinez, PD) |
| Nueva Start | SAMHSA – BHSST | Gonzalez, Subaward PD (Martinez, PD) |
| Advancing Health Equity through Integrated Care: The I-CARE Clinic (Earmark) | SAMHSA | Zoorob, PD |
| Behavioral Health American Rescue Plan Act Funding for Harris County Public Health Services (ARPA LFRF): I-Care Clinic | HUD – SMH | Kowalchuk, Subaward PI (Gilmore, PI) |
| Fueling Hope | SAMHSA – BHSST | Gonzalez, Subaward PI (Martinez, PI) |
| FRONTLINES+ Project (First Responder Opioid Overdose Naloxone Training and Linkage Into Needed Evidence-Based Services Plus) (2022 Renewal) | SAMHSA – City of Houston | Kowalchuk, Subaward PI (Shulz, PI) |
| Community Access & Resources Education Project (CARE) | SAMHSA – BHSST | Gonzalez, Subaward PD (Sanchez, PI) |
Education
The department is passionate about teaching advancements in addiction medicine and substance use prevention to the next generation of healthcare providers along with current professionals:
- MEFAM-201 Addiction Medicine: An elective two-week clinical rotation for medical students to gain an understanding of the medical care of individuals with substance use disorders across a spectrum of substances, stages of use, and presentations, including harm reduction and overdose prevention for people who continue to use.
- MS1 Practice of Medicine Course Modules: A part of the medical school mandatory curriculum covering behavioral health counseling and screening, brief intervention, referral, and treatment.
- Training at Santa Maria Hostel: A clinical environment with Alicia Kowalchuk, D.O., FASAM as Santa Maria's site director and our faculty serving as preceptors for Baylor's Addiction Psychiatry Fellowship.
- FRONTLINES+ Project (First Responder Opioid Overdose Naloxone Training and Linkage Into Needed Evidence-Based Services Plus): A grant-funded program to educate professional first responders, medical students, and the local community on overdose prevention education and naloxone distribution.