With the new year came a new role for Department of Psychology Associate Professor Dr. Jessica Magidson: Director of CESAR. 

“I am thrilled to take on this new role and the opportunity to expand the reach of the work that CESAR’s amazing team has been doing,” Dr. Magidson said. 

As part of this transition and new leadership, Dr. Magidson recently worked with the CESAR team to update the center’s formal name. Instead of “Center for Substance Abuse Research,” Dr. Magidson and the team set out to create a new center name that would not only follow the substance use field’s move away from the term “substance abuse,” but also expand CESAR’s research focus. 

The team elected to rename the center the “Center for Substance Use, Addiction & Health Research” to support the movement towards a more public health-oriented approach to treating and supporting people with substance use disorder. The team also elected to continue to use the acronym “CESAR” due to its rich history and the respected reputation of the acronym in the substance use field.

“We want CESAR to be a hub for substance use-related research that cuts across different health conditions and disciplines. Making sure the center’s name reflects our current and future collaborations with health sciences—from those in the UMD School of Public Health and the School of Medicine in Baltimore, to our global partners in sub-Saharan Africa and beyond—is something we are really excited about,” said Dr. Magidson.

CESAR was created in 1990 by the Governor’s Drug and Alcohol Abuse Commission as an interdisciplinary center housed in the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences dedicated to addressing the behavioral health problems substance use disorders may create for individuals, families, and communities. Dr. Eric Wish, an associate professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, served as the Director of CESAR since its inception. 

“It has been an honor and a privilege to lead CESAR for the past 32 years,” Dr. Wish said. “The talented and dedicated staff have worked tirelessly to support our vision to launch innovative projects in the substance use field, including the use of urine drug testing to identify emerging drugs, program evaluation, dissemination of research findings and linking people to treatment services and other resources. We have also collaborated with faculty across the university and trained numerous graduate students and research interns.”

In his work with CESAR, Dr. Wish helped the center create the National Institutes of Health’s NIDA funded National Drug Early Warning System (NDEWS) in 2014 to address emerging drug trends in the United States, and in 2017, created the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) funded Emergency Department Drug Surveillance (EDDS) program, described above, to help hospitals use urine samples to more accurately identify the drugs to which their emergency department patients may have been exposed. 

"Dr. Wish has done a fantastic job growing CESAR into one of the most well-respected centers for research on substance use, and I know speak for many in the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences when I say that we are immensely grateful for his efforts," said Susan Rivera, Dean of the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences. "I can think of no better person to fill Dr. Wish's shoes than Dr. Jessica Magidson, who has proved time and again her dedication to conducting evidence-based research benefiting individuals with substance use disorders in Maryland, as well as other parts of our world. I look forward to seeing how, under CESAR's new name and expanded focus, Dr. Magidson shepherds CESAR into a new chapter of undoubted success."

Also under Dr. Wish’s leadership, Governor Larry Hogan and Maryland’s Opioid Operational Command Center (OOCC) recently awarded CESAR a $396,090 competitive grant to expand EDDS data collection and enable rapid fentanyl testing in Maryland hospitals.

“I will continue to direct CESAR's EDDS projects and look forward to watching CESAR grow in new directions under the exceptional leadership of Dr. Jessica Magidson," Dr. Wish said.

CESAR’s past and present efforts pair well with Magidson’s research interests—and have already overlapped, with Magidson engaging CESAR research team members in the NIH’s HEAL Initiative project studying the impact a peer-based intervention can have on individuals with opioid use disorder in Baltimore.

This project is one of several NIH-funded trials Magidson is leading. Another NIH HEAL Initiative project is “PRISM” (R01DA057443)--Peer Recovery Interventions to Support Mobile Telemedicine Treatment for opioid use and polysubstance use–which takes place in rural Maryland. 

Magidson leads several other NIH-funded projects in South Africa as well. A recently funded project, “Project Khanya” (R01DA056102), evaluates a stepped-care, peer-delivered intervention to improve HIV medication adherence and substance use in primary care in Cape Town. Two additional Cape Town studies focus on how to train community health workers to reduce stigma around substance use and mental health disorders to improve engagement in tuberculosis and HIV care (R34MH122268); and how to develop a peer recovery coach model in HIV care to reduce substance use stigma among providers and improve patient engagement in care (R21DA053212). 

“CESAR is a leader in disseminating scientific results to the field, policymakers, and the public,” Dr. Magidson said. ”I'm eager to expand that focus, and to make CESAR a collaborative, interdisciplinary hub for substance use-related research in Maryland and globally. There are a lot of people doing substance use-related work within BSOS and across campuses, and I think we can do even more impactful work by working more closely together.”

Learn more about Jessica Magidson