Navigating the Intersection of Tobacco and Opioid Use Disorder

Dr. Shadi Nahvi is Professor (with tenure) in the Departments of Medicine and Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and directs the General Internal Medicine and Addiction Medicine Fellowship Programs.  Her research focuses on optimizing quality of life and health outcomes among persons with substance use disorder.

Dr. Nahvi’s research is grounded in nearly two decades of clinical experience as a primary care physician caring for persons with opioid and other substance use disorders. Her primary research focus is optimizing the efficacy and delivery of tobacco cessation treatments among persons with co-occurring substance use disorders. Currently, she is Principal Investigator of a NIDA R01-funded randomized, 2 x 2 factorial trial of directly observed and long-term varenicline treatment among smokers with opioid use disorder. She has also led a KL2 Career Development Award-funded, randomized, placebo-controlled pilot trial of varenicline for smoking cessation among smokers with co-morbid substance use disorder, a study of health system-level interventions to increase documentation and treatment of tobacco use among substance use disorder counselors, and a randomized trial of the efficacy of directly observed varenicline provided at a methadone clinic for promoting smoking cessation and enhancing adherence. 

Dr. Nahvi graduated from the Brown University School of Medicine in 2001 and completed residency training in Primary Care Internal Medicine at Bellevue Hospital and New York University Medical Center in 2004.  She then joined the faculty in the Albert Einstein College of Medicine Division of Substance Abuse as the Medical Director of an opioid treatment program. From 2006-2008, Dr. Nahvi completed a faculty fellowship supported by the Bronx Center to Reduce and Eliminate Ethnic and Racial Health Disparities and received a MS in Clinical Research Methods. 

Dr. Nahvi has served on numerous national advisory committees, including serving as a member of the Advisory Committee of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco Health Disparities Network, and co-chair of the Evaluation Committee of the Health Disparities Network; a member of the NY State Department of Health AIDS Institute’s Guideline Committee for the Care of Substance Users; and a Steering Committee member of the NY State Department of Health AIDS Institute's Tobacco Cessation Improvement Campaign.