ADDICTION: NEW TREATMENT APPROACH

The following is an excerpt from my article in progress introducing the Lifestyle Changes Healthy Healing Addiction Treatment Program: HEALTHY HEALING AN INTENSIVE-INTENSIVE OUTPATIENT PROGRAM: A Year Long Alternative Approach to Healing From Addiction; By MA Fabry, BA, CADCII, June, 2009

“Dr. Mark Willenbring recently wrote an article for ADDICTION PROFESSIONAL magazine (Sept/Oct 2008` Vol 6 No 5, page 12) suggesting that a fundamental change needed to be done to redefine alcohol treatment. Among the topics of this article were who, and who did not receive specialty addiction treatment and why; continuum of need, and structural barriers. One of his suggestions was for expanding the elements of the continuum of need and care. Willenbring said “Since no one behavioral approach has better overall outcomes than others, clients should have a choice of available, effective treatment…Because most people in need of specialty treatment have chronic, relapsing dependence as well as co-existing physical mental disorders, specialty addiction treatment should seamlessly integrate addiction, primary medical, and psychiatric treatments” Dr. Willenbring is just one voice of many addiction experts calling for addiction specialists to step out of the traditional box of treatment and come up with new approaches.

Dr. Willenbring’s article added fuel to my fire of thoughts about how addiction treatment appears to be limited to one or two models—almost a cookie-cutter approach for wellness. Because addicts are individuals, and I have never treated any two addicts that are the same, the cookie-cutter traditional approach to treatment didn’t feel right to me. Further, the results never appeared to be too impressive and/or inspiring. The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) validates this observation “No single treatment is appropriate for all individuals.” I started researching behavioral approaches for addiction and mental illnesses; I also looked at pharmaceutical and medical models. I developed a program called LIFESTYLE CHANGES: HEALTHY HEALING ADDICTION TREATMENT PROGRAM, to accept the challenge set forth by Dr. Willenbring “to begin to redefine alcohol treatment that may challenge the conventional wisdom among addiction professionals.”

HEALTHY HEALING ADDICTION TREATMENT may not be like other treatments presently offered, but, then, the goal of this program is to meet addiction professional’s challenge to “redefine alcohol treatment that may challenge the conventional wisdom.’”

Learn more about the HEALTHY HEALING ADDICTION TREATMENT at

http://www.lifestylechangescounseling.com