Drug Addiction: Therapeutic Communities Breaking the Cycle of Addicted Mothers

Abstract

Fresh Hope (FH) is an in-house residential therapeutic drug-rehabilitation facility assisting mothers with children to break the cycle of addiction.  FH uses 'community' as democratic method to address: drug addiction, anti-social behaviors, re-establish positive relationships with children and to live drug free. Residents take part in a 4 stage 18 months Community Drug Rehabilitative Treatment Experience/Program and a semi-structured Personal/Community Engagement Experience/Program. An archival study design was used to measure the efficacy of program against two measures: completion of stages and whether residents were living drug-free after successfully graduating from the program. Since 2000 to 2011 around 144 participants entered the program. Over 49% successfully completed Stage 1 (Detoxification Phase); with 25% completing Stage 2, and 15% (n= 21) graduating from the full program (Stage 3 and 4). A post-release follow up of graduates (n=21) after 11 years found that 90% are living drug-free (ranging from 1 to 12 years) and are productive members in the community. The value in this finding is that therapeutic communities operating under the premise of a democratic method of treatment provide a useful non-instructive alternative to clinical treatments.