Problem drug use
Drug treatment lacks performance measures.
The latest reports from the National Audit Office (NAO) suggets that drug services lack effective performance measures in determining ‘value for money’ in respect of the £ 1.2bn a year funding that the taxpayer makes in tackling the problem.
Although there are 195,000 adults in treatment the levels of ’success’ are difficult to evaluate. Problem drug use in the UK review
The NAO reports that ‘around 80% of problem users claiming benefits at a cost of over £ 40m a year’ just 8% of people get a job for 13 weeks or more.
Charitable drug services in decline
Many drug users and their families complain that voluntary UK charities services have been de-commissioned due to the hostile attitude of statutory agencies.
Many of those UK charities provided holistic services , including housing, support, counselling, advocacy, integrating users back into the community and family members. Users of current statutory drug services often see the ‘treatment’ programes as basically dispensing ‘addictive’ chemicals as a form of crime prevention rather than providing long term health and support.
US Drugs czar offers new approach to treatment
Prof Thomas Mc Lellan the Deputy Director of the US Office of National Drug Control policy at a recent London conference raised the issue of integrated treatment service as the way forward. He suggests that over-reliance on methadone is not the solution. He believes that whilst Methadone is important for treating heroin users methadone is just another option in the ‘patient choice’ toolkit and should be offered alongside other medication, social services, employment,counselling and psychiatric services to make up the package of rehabilitation.
Abstinence-based programmes
There is growing evidence that providing drug users with a more positive attitude to abstinence can provide better chances of recovery and rehabilitation.
This has always been the attitude of highly successful services such as Alcohol Anonymous for alcoholics.
A new UK programme imported from the USA is Smart Recovery SmartRecovery
Tags: Drug Testing services, employee drug testing, workplace drug testing