Ther are times in drug and alcohol rehab where everyone sometimes slips into the role of a "religious zealot". By this I mean you get a little bit over exuberant in promoting what you will think will help people the most in their struggle with addicition. It is easy to do. The stakes for clients facing drug and alcohol abuse are very high. When you see people take their life in a new exciting and useful direction, it is natural to want to help more and more clients. We all sometime must be careful not to remove choice in this process though.
The reason for this is clear. When clients have more choice, everyone does better. Most drug and alcohol rehab promote abstinence. Many believe the only chance clients have is through abstinence. There again is a reasonably large group of people who believe that by the time most clients get to a drug rehab center, presenting any sort of harm reduction model, or controlled use program, would be useless or even dangerous.
The data shows this is not necessarily the case though. The research shows that offering different treatment goals (abstinence vs harm reduction) to clients improves outcomes. Doing this increases the number of people willing to seek treatment. It also lowers the numbers of clients leaving programs. You get these two positive benefits without any increase in relapse rates.
Choice leads to more clients looking for help, pure and simple. The purpose of drug and alcohol rehabs is to help people, so offering a choice in a program looks like it will lead to helping more clients.
