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Relapse
Prevention or NON-DUI
treatment |
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SERVICES
LINKS
CONTACT US |
MWSE offers court ordered and voluntary
Non-DUI or Relapse Prevention classes. These classes meet once a week and are
directed towards people who have been convicted of an alcohol or drug charge.
This does not include a driving under the influence charge. Non-DUI or Relapse Prevention groups deal
with specific relapse potentials, positive vs. negative behaviors,
self-esteem, past and present family issues and behavioral change tools.
Additional topics will be addressed depending on individual and group needs. The therapy manual used in Relapse Prevention is How to Escape Your Prison: A Moral Reconation Therapy workbook which is a systematic
treatment strategy that seeks to decrease recidivism among juvenile and adult
criminal and substance abuse offenders by increasing moral reasoning. It is
cognitive-behavior (for more information on cognitive behavior therapy see
below) approach combines elements to progressively address ego, social, moral
and positive behavioral growth. Additional
manuals are used from the State approved agency, The Change Companies
Please ask us about reduced-cost services
for indigent and low-income clients. Please call (303) 665-7037 for specific court related requirements. Services are available for anyone on a voluntary basis, while on bond, Probation clients as well as Parole clients. |
Relapse Prevention
using Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy: Cognitive-behavioral
coping skills treatment (CBT) is a short-term, focused approach to helping
substance abusers and dependent individuals.
The term abuser or dependent individual is used to refer to individuals
who meet DSM-IV criteria for substance abuse or dependence. The underlying
assumption is that learning processes play an important role in the development
and continuation of substance abuse and dependence. These same learning
processes can be used to help individuals reduce their drug/alcohol use.
CBT
attempts to help patients recognize, avoid, and cope. That is, RECOGNIZE the
situations in which they are most likely to use substances, AVOID these
situations when appropriate, and COPE more effectively with a range of problems
and problematic behaviors associated with substance abuse.
Several
important features of CBT treatment for substance abuse and dependence:
·
CBT is
structured, goal-oriented, and focused on the immediate problems faced by
substance abusers entering treatment who are struggling to control their usage.
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CBT is a
flexible, individualized approach that can be adapted to a wide range of
patients as well as a variety of settings and formats.
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CBT is
compatible with a range of other treatments such as pharmacotherapy.
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CBT
has two critical ingredients:
Functional
analysis -For each instance of substance use during treatment, the therapist
and patient do a functional analysis, that is, they identify the patient's
thoughts, feelings, and circumstances before and after the substance use. Early
in treatment, the functional analysis plays a critical role in helping the
patient and therapist assess the determinants, or high-risk situations, that
are likely to lead to substance use and provides insights into some of the reasons
the individual may be using substances as coping with interpersonal
difficulties, to experience risk or euphoria not otherwise available in the
patient's life. Later in treatment, functional analyses of episodes of
substance use may identify those situations or states in which the individual
still has difficulty coping.
·
Skills
training- The individual may have never learned effective
strategies to cope with the challenges and problems of adult life, as when
substance use begins during early adolescence.
·
Although the
individual may have acquired effective strategies at one time, these skills may
have decayed through repeated reliance on substance use as a primary means of
coping. These patients have essentially forgotten effective strategies because
of chronic involvement in a drug-using lifestyle in which the bulk of their
time is spent in acquiring, using, and then recovering from the effects of
drugs.
·
The
individual's ability to use effective coping strategies may be weakened by
other problems, such as substance abuse with concurrent psychiatric disorders.
Because substance abusers are a heterogeneous group and typically come to
treatment with a wide range of problems. The first few sessions focus on skills related to initial control of
substance use through identification of high-risk situations, coping with
thoughts about substance usage. Once these basic skills are mastered, training
is broadened to include a range of other problems with which the individual may
have difficulty coping as social isolation and unemployment. Skills training focuses on both
intrapersonal- coping with craving; and interpersonal- refusing offers of any
substances skills. CBT is not only
geared to helping each patient reduce and eliminate substance use while in
treatment, but also to imparting skills that can benefit the patient long after
treatment.
Length of treatment varies:
CBT has been offered in 12 -16 for substances users once a week and for individuals
who are dependent on substances 16 – 24 sessions once a week. This
comparatively brief, short-term treatment is intended to produce initial
abstinence and stabilization. In many cases, this is sufficient to bring about
sustained improvement for as long as a year after treatment ends. Preliminary
data suggest that patients who are able to attain 3 or more weeks of continuous
abstinence from substances during the 12-week treatment period are generally
able to maintain good outcome during the 12 months after treatment ends. For
many patients, however, brief treatment is not sufficient to produce
stabilization or lasting improvement. In these cases, CBT is seen as
preparation for longer term treatment. Further treatment is recommended
directly when the patient requests it or when the patient has not been able to
achieve 3 or more weeks of continuous abstinence during the initial treatment.
Currently additional booster sessions of CBT during the 6 months following the
initial treatment phase improves outcome involving both individual and
continued group counseling. CBT and MET share an exploration, early in the
treatment process, of what patients stand to gain or lose through continued
substance use as a strategy to build patients' motivation to change their
substance abuse. CBT and MET differ
primarily in emphasis on skill training. In MET, responsibility for how
patients are to go about changing their behavior is left to the patients; it is
assumed that patients can use available resources to change behavior and
training is not required. CBT theory maintains that learning and practice of
specific substance-related coping skills foster abstinence. Thus, because they
focus on different aspects of the change process (MET on why patients may go
about changing their substance use, CBT on how patients might do so), these two
approaches may be seen as complementary. For example, for a patient with low
motivation and few resources, an initial focus on motivational strategies
before turning to specific coping skills (MET before CBT) may be the most
productive approach adopted by this agency.
This site was last updated on February 20, 2011 | Copyright 2010 Men and Women Seeking Empowerment