Bicycle Health Offers Virtual Opioid Use Disorder Treatment to Teens in Maine

Traditionally serving adults, virtual opioid use disorder provider Bicycle Health launched a new program Tuesday for teens in Maine.

Bicycle Health, based in Boston, offers medication for addiction treatment, access to medical experts, therapy and peer support groups. It serves patients across 32 states and works with most major insurance plans, including UnitedHealthcare, Aetna and Blue Cross Blue Shield.

The company’s new virtual adolescent care program in Maine will support teens over the age of 16. For their first visit, they must be accompanied by a parent or responsible adult. If considered eligible for care, they’ll gain access to Bicycle’s clinical support, including medications for opioid use disorder, such as FDA-approved buprenorphine. This medication can help with withdrawal symptoms and reduce drug cravings.

Adolescents’ care will be tailored to each patient, said Dr. Brian Clear, chief medical officer of Bicycle Health.

“Bicycle Health builds its care recommendations around individual patient needs and the current state-of-the-art addiction medicine guidelines and research,” Clear said in an email. “This will remain the case for patients aged 16 and 17 in this program, who will be treated per recommendations for adolescents with [opioid use disorder].”

Typically, adolescents with opioid use disorder are treated using a “step-wise approach” with many starting their treatment in abstinence-based residential programs, according to Clear. However, these programs have a high rate of relapse. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends medications like buprenorphine for treating teens with severe opioid use disorder.

To measure the success of the new program in Maine, the company will examine enrollment rates, patient and provider feedback and patient retention. Bicycle Health also follows these metrics for its adult population, Clear said.

Bicycle Health chose to start this program in Maine because providers in the state informed the company of the need for this kind of treatment, he noted. In 2019, 10% of high school students in Maine reported misusing prescription pain medications. A 2023 survey found that approximately 5.2% of Maine high school students had taken a prescription drug without a doctor’s prescription in the past 30 days. 

Clear added that the company is looking into expanding its adolescent services to other states.

“We are hopeful that this program will be a successful blueprint that we will be able to build on to continue to increase access for adolescents struggling with [opioid use disorder],” Clear stated. 

Ultimately, treating adolescents in Maine is “just another step” in Bicycle Health’s mission to battle the opioid epidemic, Clear declared.

“Our goal for this program is to make safe and effective OUD treatment easily accessible for adolescents in need of the service,” he said. “Many adults struggling with OUD today can see risk behaviors or addictive patterns that started in their youth; these problems may persist and worsen for years or decades before being addressed, yet they are treatable at any age. We hope that programs like this that help patients start their recovery journey earlier will help prevent the worst impacts of OUD for more people nationwide.”

Other companies that provide virtual addiction services include Ophelia and Boulder Care. The latter also has a program for adolescents. In January, Boulder announced that it would be offering telehealth and medication management services to eligible teens in Washington covered by UnitedHealthcare Community Plan, a Medicaid plan.

Photo credit: Bohdan Skrypnyk, Getty Images