Topic: co-occurring disorders

With a little leverage and some understanding of effective therapeutic technique, you can increase the chances of successful outcomes with these clients.

There’s this big group we lump under the heading ‘precontemplation’. But in practice, there are precontemplators, and pre-pre-contemplators, and pre-pre-pre-pre-pre-contemplators.

The way the “interven-ee” feels about the intervention changes a lot, from the beginning of the intervention, by the end of the intervention, during treatment and after, and years into recovery.

We can’t always predict which problem will require attention first — or indeed, when opening a door in therapy will introduce a whole new set of emotional needs and issues.

Therapy we might see as fiddling with the ‘software’. Not so different from treating a chronic disease such as diabetes, where education and counseling improve outcomes.

It took a while to develop effective guidelines for use of psychiatric meds with a population that was already addicted.

The key to treatment success is an integrated approach: One treatment team treats both illnesses using an integrated treatment plan.

The behavior of antisocial persons is a challenge to traditional substance abuse counseling. Offender populations are packed with antisocial clients. It helps to address these behaviors directly, beginning with the treatment plan.

It may help in understanding how the problems that plague some of us throughout life may have come about. And hopefully, in doing so, remove a bit the shame and stigma that often accompanies such problems.

Diabetics and heart patients are asked to make changes in lifestyle to reduce the risk of future crisis. Therapy is sometimes used to support those changes.