Anika Alvanzo, MD, MS, DFASAM, FACP
Principal
Health Management Associates
Baltimore, MD
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Dr. Anika Alvanzo is a distinguished healthcare executive with over 20 years of experience in specialty addiction treatment, behavioral health integration and quality improvement.
Prior to joining Health Management Associates, Dr. Alvanzo was a regional medical director for Pyramid Healthcare, Inc., where she was responsible for optimizing and standardizing medical care, emphasizing substance withdrawal management and pharmacotherapy, within the residential addiction treatment programs in eastern Pennsylvania and Maryland. She developed and implemented protocols for management of alcohol, benzodiazepine, and opioid withdrawal syndromes, led teams of physicians and advance practice practitioners within each treatment site, and provided education and training to medical, nursing, and counseling staff. She also facilitated standardization of medical documentation and developed COVID-19 and influenza testing and management protocols in a joint effort with Pyramid’s infection control nurse.
Earning recognition as a national leader in addiction medicine, Dr. Alvanzo was a faculty member in the Divisions of General Internal Medicine and Addiction Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. She held various clinical leadership roles, including associate medical director and medical director of the comprehensive opioid treatment programs (OTPs) on the Johns Hopkins Bayview and Johns Hopkins Hospital campuses, respectively. For seven years, she directed the multidisciplinary addiction consultation service providing clinical consultation, brief intervention and treatment linkage services for patients admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital, for which she won the annual Johns Hopkins Medicine Clinical Collaboration and Teamwork award. Dr. Alvanzo also gained experience providing office-based buprenorphine treatment in various treatment settings, including a mobile van parked outside of the Baltimore City Detention Center.
Dr. Alvanzo has more than a decade of teaching experience. She directed the addiction medicine rotation for the Johns Hopkins Medicine-Pediatrics Urban Health and Urban Health Primary Care Internal Medicine Residency track programs. She also taught courses on the fundamentals of addiction medicine, treatment of opioid use disorder, the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) criteria, and most recently served as faculty for the ASAM course on racism in the history of substance use and addiction.
Dr. Alvanzo has served as a subject matter expert on national panels, including the National Institutes of Health, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, National Quality Forum, and PEW Research Center on topics such as opioids and chronic pain, quality metric development and medication for opioid use disorder (MOUD) integration. Her publications span topics including gender, race, and ethnicity differences in the trajectory of and service utilization for substance use disorders; alcohol withdrawal management; and the association between psychological trauma, posttraumatic stress, and substance use, particularly in women.
Dr. Alvanzo earned her Doctor of Medicine degree from the George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. She also holds a master’s degree in biostatistics from Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) and a bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Virgina. Dr. Alvanzo is board certified in internal medicine and addiction medicine, is a fellow of the American College of Physicians (ACP) and is a distinguished fellow of ASAM.