Medical providers have shifted how they treat addiction and substance abuse over the years with more of a focus on evidence based treatment methods.

We're also seeing more medical facilities open specifically to address the disease.

That's the case in Bergen County, where the new Bridge Medical Center recently opened the 80, the Center for Comprehensive Addiction Treatment.

Senior correspondent Joanna Gagis reports.

Advocates say centers like this are the future in caring for the person as a whole.

The need is there.

We're seeing our communities suffering.

Young people.

Older people suffering from substance use disorder and to meet that need.

Bergen New Bridge Medical Center in Paramus recently launched the Comprehensive Center for Addiction Treatment, or CCAT.

We have a little bit of everything.

We have outpatient programs.

We have intensive outpatient treatment programs.

We have an inpatient medical withdrawal management unit, and we have rehabilitation units as well.

Plus, we partner with Integrity House as a residential treatment partner in the communities.

Integrity House has locations around New Jersey that provide therapy and mental health services for those struggling with addiction.

But here at New Bridge, those therapeutic services are also provided as part of the new center.

Different strategies work for different people, and so having a very large menu of options available for people with different types of addictions and also different severities of addictions is very important.

If somebody is chemically dependent on a substance and wants to stop that, they come in for what we call withdrawal management, which we used to call detox for some we're just the bridge, so we will take care of them for a week or two while they come, you know, after they come off of our hospital unit and then they will find treatment closer to their home.

Because substance use disorder can be complicated to treat.

The goal here is to put all of the services under one roof, including acute care and primary care, where the services come right to the patient.

So individuals who suffer from addictions many times have other co-morbid conditions.

They either suffer from chronic conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, asthma and other chronic diseases that they may not have had an opportunity to take care of.

So for us here at Bergen New Bridge Medical Center, we treat the disease but care for the individual and they can get primary care.

They can get diagnostic care treatments here, specialized care, all under one roof.

It's a model that hasn't been tried yet in the state.

But as a safety net hospital, they'll be able to treat individuals with every form of insurance and use charity care to treat those who are uninsured or underinsured.

Another way they're breaking the mold and eliminating stigma in the care that they provide.

Society still views addiction very much as some kind of moral failing or a series of bad choices, but we don't see that anymore as the model.

The model really is to view addiction as a chronic medical disease.

They work to make sure any patient who needs medication to help with addiction can get it.

Although they don't use the phrase medication assisted treatment, which is how providers typically refer to opioid treatments, Accurso says Just like any other disease, it's simply called medication.

It's been demonstrated that the way we frame the treatment influences the way we treat people.

So, for instance, some words are out.

Words like addict are out, somebody with the disease of addiction.

We say the word abuse is out.

It's not helpful for us to talk about abuse.

You know, people use drugs.

So if some people see when people are using the drugs in the wrong way, we would say they have a substance use disorder.

And just like some people have diabetes and some people have blood pressure, that's too high.

As they work to change views around addiction and try to reach those in need, Accurso says he remains committed because.

When addiction treatment is working well, it's incredibly stabilizing and it's very.

Rewarding.

In Paramus, I'm Joanna Gagis, NJ Spotlight News.