When I was still attending my addiction counseling classes at UCLA, we often discussed the many different tools now available when treating drug abuse (CBT, 12 step, medications, rapid detox, etc.). Still, most of the class members focused on how many of these don’t work with everyone and how some have actually resulted in problems for certain patients. I think this is a mistake.
Like a physician treating any other chronic disease, I think that practitioners in the field of addiction need to come to terms with reality: Chronic conditions (and I don’t mean smoking good weed) are difficult to treat. Still, cancer treatment works by trying the best possible method, then the next, and then the next, until all options have been exhausted. In the addiction world, most therapists and counselors still stick to their guns with the method they believe work best.
Unlike with roses, an addict is not an addict, is not an addict… Different methods will work for different people. It isn’t hard to believe this when you consider the fact that while many addicts recover within outpatient substance abuse treatment settings, others need an intensive residential program, and some recover spontaneously with no real intervention.
It’s time to start focusing on results in this field and leave the moral dogma behind. If there’s a tool that can help, we need to put it into action. It’s that simple.