What is the average success rate for rehabilitation centers

What is the Average Success Rate for Rehabilitation Centers?

Addiction recovery can present a struggle that might, at the outset, seem insurmountable. When addiction to a substance has taken hold of your mind and your body, a constant internal dialogue of failure and despair can run through your brain. When you get to the point where you know that you don’t want to live this way anymore, where you know that you need help, you will want to make sure that you find the resources that will actually give you the tools that you need to succeed and conquer the addiction. Unfortunately, many of the most popular rehabilitation programs do not actually have the statistical success rates to back up their claims. For example, 12-step programs only show about a 3% success rate and other alternative approaches usually only show a 10% success rate. Let’s take a look at why this might be and at the differences that can bring about higher rates of success.

Language The language we use to talk about addiction and recovery can be pivotal to our success at overcoming addiction. Unfortunately, a lot of programs currently available discuss addiction in terms of disease and permanency. If the focus, of the literature, meetings, and therapy, is on the disease and how to work around a permanent structure in your life, chances are, you won’t see the inner change you were hoping for. Instead, find a program that

focuses on you—on your potential, your worth, and your ability to change. For a program to have a lasting effect, it must talk about hope and change, not just coping and disease.

The issue of language also affects any publicized rates of success. Some centers use language to paint a certain picture about their results that simply does not exist. You have to be careful to check who conducted the research that led to these rates and how it was conducted. You want results that come from follow-up surveys that gather information from people years after they went through the initial program.

Environment Another key element to any rehabilitation program’s success rate is the environment they create. For example, many programs remove a person from normal life in an effort to distance them from their addiction triggers. A program like this might report a high success rate. However, you need to research this carefully and see what they are basing their numbers on. Are they talking about how many people finished their program? If so, what happened to those people once they were back out in the real world? That’s what’s really important. If a program is constantly putting you at odds with reality, creating an artificial fear of the world and of what you might do once you are back out in the world, it’s not going to be an effective long-term treatment. Look for a program that keeps you in your normal environment, that works with you and your loved ones to help you all make positive changes and create a “real world” that supports your lifelong effort to improve and make good choices. There are programs out there that really do have the success stories to back

up their claims. Just make sure you do your research and find a program that works with the whole person to help them create lasting change for themselves. *First image from http://www.care2.com/greenliving/8-ways-meditation-can-change-yourlife.html/meditation-pose

*Second image from http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Family_Portrait_.jpg