Our Team

Ms. Jessica Nickel is the founder of the Addiction Policy Forum, a national nonprofit organization to help patients, families, and communities affected by the disease. She has more than 25 years’ experience in the field of prevention and the fight against substance use disorders. 

Ms. Nickel has collaborated with top scientists in the nation to develop scientific materials on Substance Use Disorder into more digestible language. She has also conducted multiple CME trainings for professionals in the medical field and other key informant groups. Ms. Nickel started and spearheaded the Addiction Policy Forum’s Emergency Medicine Initiative, a partnership with the Yale School of Medicine and the American College of Emergency Physicians, as well the Addiction Policy Forum’s Scientific Advisory Board (SAB).

In 2017, Ms. Nickel testified before the President’s Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis, which involved providing recommendations to the committee on how best to implement a comprehensive response to address the opioid crisis. In addition, she testified before the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and the U.S. House of Representatives’ Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Health in 2018 on critical provisions that were ultimately included in the historic SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act. Prior to that, she worked on the passage of the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act, the Second Chance Act, and the Drug-Free Communities Act, to name a few. 

Ms. Nickel currently serves on the board of directors for the DEA Educational Foundation and was recently appointed to sit on Ohio Governor Mike DeWine’s newly created Recovery Ohio Advisory Council. She is also a current co-PI on a NIH-funded grant, assisting in building the stakeholder engagement and dissemination plans for the Justice Community Opioid Innovation Network (JCOIN), funded through the NIH HEAL Initiative.