Self Paced Online Courses

There are 4 modules in this series. This course is designed to inform participants about the basic principles of caring for persons who suffer from withdrawal from alcohol and other drugs. Module 2 is designed to inform participants about the basic principles of caring for persons who suffer from withdrawal from alcohol and other drugs.

Peer support is a system of giving and receiving help founded on key principles of respect, shared responsibility and mutual agreement of what is helpful. Individuals who have common life experiences with the people they are serving deliver peer support services. By sharing their experiences, peers bring hope to people in recovery and promote a sense of belonging within the community. The services often provided by peers are multi-faceted and include, but are not limited to: individual advocacy, education, development of natural supports, support of work or other meaningful activity of the individual’s choosing, crisis management support, and specific skills training.

Risk-need-responsivity theory is based primarily on theories of behavioral psychology and is intended to support efforts at crime prevention through providing services targeted towards individual criminogenic risk factors. The Risk Principle involves matching the level of service to the individuals risk to reoffend. There is a growing support in the research for reserving treatment resources for high risk offenders. The Need principle involves assessing each person for known criminogenic needs and target treatment based on their most salient needs. The Responsivity principle involves maximizing the potential success of rehabilitative intervention by providing cognitive behavioral treatment and tailoring the intervention to the learning styles, secondary needs, motivation, and strength of the offender.

It has long been recognized that abuse by an intimate partner can have traumatic mental health and substance use effects. Research has found high rates of both past and current intimate partner violence (IPV) among people in substance use disorder and mental health treatment settings. A growing body of evidence has found that abuse is often targeted at a partner’s substance use and mental health in deliberate attempts to undermine and control survivors and keep them from achieving their recovery goals. These forms of abuse, known as substance use coercion and mental health coercion, not only jeopardize the well-being of survivors and their children, but also compromise the effectiveness of mental health and substance use disorder treatment. All of this is further complicated by escalating rates and severity of IPV during the COVID-19 pandemic. This session will provide treatment and recovery specialists with a conceptual framework for understanding survivors’ patterns of substance use within the context of IPV, will prepare practitioners to recognize and respond to substance use coercion and mental health coercion within treatment and recovery services, and will equip practitioners with strategies and resources tobetter serve survivors and their children.

Treatment providers and program evaluators use patient placement criteria to ensure that clients are placed in the appropriate level of care. This video will provide an overview of The American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) Criteria, 3rd Edition for clients with substance use and co-occurring disorders. Participants will learn to appropriately apply the admission, continued service and transfer/discharge criteria for adolescents and adults. The ASAM Criteria utilizes six dimensions to form a broad assessment, which in turn provides information for service and treatment planning across all levels of care. Participants will learn to assess mild, moderate, and severe effects of substance use on each dimension as it relates to placement criteria.