The American Demand for Substance Use Disorder Treatment

Substance abuse counselors work with individuals and groups to provide counseling, education, and support to those struggling with substance use disorders. They may also provide case management services and refer clients to other resources, such as support groups or 12-step programs. Addiction has been described as resulting in the activation of a cognitive self-schema, in which the individual self-identifies as an addict and processes incoming information accordingly [40]. When one self-identifies as in recovery from an addiction, the implication is that they have recognized the addict-schema and shifted to a recovery-oriented schema.

• More than 39 million adults with a substance use disorder did not receive treatment in 2022, according to the latest data from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
• Seeking Safety educates clients about the link between trauma, substance use, and coping skills and acknowledges how people often use substances to cope with anxiety.
• Living in this monitored community may be beneficial because the person’s old familiar environment may have influenced their substance use.
• Eleven participants reported licenses and credentials such as substance abuse counselors, social workers, and psychologists.
• Addiction presents different issues that vary from person to person, so counselors need to tailor their treatment plans to address a variety of needs.

All phone interviews were conducted from the researcher’s private home office in New York State. Only one interview was interrupted briefly when the participant received another call and put the interviewer on hold for approximately five minutes. The purpose of phenomenological research is to create a situation in which findings come from the interviewee’s actual lived experience, with no predetermined answers provided by the researcher. substance abuse counseling For this reason, qualitative research is often used to discover trends and generate hypotheses that can be further refined and elaborated in future quantitative studies. The findings reported here emerged during analysis of transcribed interviews and were not responses to any specific question posed by the study. The guide allowed for flexibility while ensuring that the same topics would be covered with each participant.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

Counselors are trained to think beyond the counseling session and always make treatment decisions in the patient’s best interest. HHS, through SAMHSA, announced $36.9 million in notices of funding opportunities for grant programs supporting behavioral health services across the U.S. today. The role of the counselor in addiction https://ecosoberhouse.com/article/alcoholic-liver-disease-symptom-and-treatment/ treatment involves far more than just talking an addict through treatment. Counselors have to be highly empathetic people, who have a passion for building relationships with their patients. Counselors also work with families to help them better understand their loved one’s illness and guide their interactions with them.

In the past, addiction was often regarded as a character flaw or moral failure. John C. Umhau, MD, MPH, CPE is board-certified in addiction medicine and preventative medicine. For over 20 years Dr. Umhau was a senior clinical investigator at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

SAMHSA’s National Helpline

Thus training programs that provide formal practicum, internships, and supervision, most often found in graduate school, are likely to generate the most prepared counselors. An initial analysis examined the characteristics of the CTN workforce including medical and support staff (14). According to NIDA, it’s important to recognize that group therapy is not the same as 12-step programs like AA or NA. While these programs do take part in a group setting, they are support groups not therapeutic groups. Most effective treatment programs provide access to a combination of individual substance abuse counseling, group therapy and support groups such as 12-step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous. Evidence-based practice (EBP) requires the clinician to integrate knowledge of the best ESTs, the individual patients’ characteristics and preferences, and their own clinical expertise to arrive at a treatment plan that is individualized for each patient [41].

Substance abuse counselors are a diverse group with a range of education levels and backgrounds. In many states it is possible to become a counselor with as little as a general high-school equivalency diploma and some counseling-specific coursework [12]. In any educational or credentialing category, a clinician may or may not self-identify as personally being in recovery from addiction. Counselor recovery status is the single most researched factor in the diverse population of substance abuse treatment providers [13]. Adoption of medication in substance abuse treatment is an area where there is variable workforce support. For example, Thomas and colleagues (15) examined adoption of naltrexone in a mailed survey of alcoholism treatment clinicians.

What’s the job market like for substance abuse counselors?

Further, translational research confirms the importance of the treatment provider workforce, organizational factors, and environmental issues in this process of implementation of new practices. Thus, in order to improve quality of care and champion adoption of evidence-based practices, a comprehensive understanding of the workforce is critical. As noted in previous research, closure of many treatment agencies and an increasing demand for effective treatment and documentation of outcomes creates enormous pressure for an already strained addiction workforce (19). The findings from this study are significant as they expand our understanding of the characteristics, experiences, and needs of the addiction treatment workforce. This information can be used to advance the quality of care and the types of services offered for clients with addictive disorders. Addiction counselors, historically referred to as substance abuse counselors, provide expert care and support to people who struggle with a variety of mental health disorders.

Further, providers that support traditional twelve-step approaches, have longer tenure in the field, and identify as being in recovery, may be more resistant to implementation of new interventions (24). In addition, counselor attitudes toward drug treatment also differ by treatment setting. Access to evidence-based practices across the substance use disorder treatment continuum is critical to improving client outcomes and improving the quality of care overall. Research in other areas of medicine has suggested that the transfer of research findings into clinical practice may take up to 17 years (18).