Leslie Hayes, MD

Leslie Hayes, MD works for El Centro Family Health in Española, NM. She is board-certified in both addiction and family medicine. While Dr. Hayes enjoys all aspects of family medicine, her particular passion is taking care of people with opioid use disorder. She especially enjoys working with pregnant women and new mothers who have had drug problems and works hard to make sure that they and their babies receive compassionate and appropriate medical care. She got much of her training in substance use disorders through Project ECHO. Project ECHO relies on didactics and case presentations to teach providers new skills. She now considers herself extremely fortunate to have been able to give back to Project ECHO, and she now provides training for other providers around the state of New Mexico in substance use disorder and use of buprenorphine. She was named a White House Champion of Change in April of 2016 for her work with substance use disorder and pregnancy. Her work was also featured in The Providers, an award-winning documentary about rural health care airing on PBS.

NM Bridge Implementation Team:

Dr. Hayes is Clinical Director of Women’s Health and Obstetrical Care. She is responsible for helping guide clinical policy around women’s health in general, and especially helping to come up with evidence-based policies for labor and delivery units. This includes policy around prenatal care, intrapartum and postpartum care, and care of newborns, including breastfeeding and treatment of NOWS.