Dr. Karen Alexander Co-Authors Article on Use of Mindfulness in Mothers Struggling with Opioid Use Disorders

Dr. Karen Alexander, Assistant Professor in the Jefferson College of Nursing, served as first author on an article entitled, "Implementation of a Mindfulness Intervention for Women in Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder and Its Effects on Depression Symptoms", which was published in Mental Health Nursing, May 17, 2019. This is a publication of her teams's research which examined whether a mindfulness-based parenting intervention could help mothers in treatment for opioid use disorder. “The women treated through the MATER program at Jefferson have often experienced a number of traumatic events in their lives, or are dealing with ongoing traumas,” said Dr. Alexander. “We suspected that learning to put aside the parts of their lives that they can’t control, and focusing on the present, where they do have agency, could help these women with psychosocial needs that medications alone cannot address.”