Adolescent Substance Abuse Treatment

Unsurprising news for those of us in Reclaiming Futures: a study funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation found that only about 10 percent of adolescents who have substance abuse problems actually enter treatment, partly because the nation lacks sufficient teen-only treatment services. Furthermore, of the adolescent treatment programs that are available, very few receive "high marks for quality." You can find the actual study in the March 2009 issue of the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment.
More news:

A recent national survey of attitudes toward addiction performed by Hazelden contains some encouraging news: 

• 77% of Americans agree that addiction treatment should be part of healthcare reform (though many are unsure if their own insurance plan covers it); and
• 78% of Americans "understand that drug addiction is a chronic disease rather than a personal failing."

Lourdes Rosado is a Senior Attorney for Juvenile Law Center. Below, she introduces a useful guide to help your community screen teens for behavioral health and drug problems while protecting their rights in and out of juvenile court. Juvenile Law Center is the oldest multi-issue public interest law firm in the country dedicated to advancing the rights and well-being of children in jeopardy.—Ed. 
In the last decade, states and localities have worked hard to identify and treat the large percentage of youth in the juvenile justice system who have mental health and substance abuse disorders.

Gregg Roth, Reclaiming Futures Nassau County, NY from Reclaiming Futures NPO on Vimeo.

[Gregg Roth is a prosecutor in the Nassau County Juvenile Drug Treatment Court and a member of the Nassau County Juvenile Drug Treatment Court/Reclaiming Futures Change Team. -Ed.]

A couple days ago, we posted six tips on engaging family members in your efforts to reform the juvenile justice system and how it works with teens with drug and alcohol problems. Grace Bauer, who authored the tips, wrote to say that some excellent additional resources are coming:

Youth Today reports that the number of juveniles in the justice system who commit suicide while confined is higher than anyone thought -- worse yet, their deaths often go unreported to state authorities.
We know this because the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) commissioned a report, Characteristics of Juvenile Suicide in Confinement. Though the report was completed in 2004, it was only released yesterday. The author blames former top OJJDP administrator, J. Robert Flores for the delay. 
One takeaway: youth entering detention should be given mental health assessments as soon as possible. Over half of the youth who killed themselves in detention did so within the first six days, and only 35% had received a mental health assessment by then. Stands to reason that a youth's alcohol and drug use should also be assessed at the same time.

Families can be one of the most powerful levers for changing how youth in the juvenile justice system access alcohol and drug treatment -- and improving its quality. But involving family members in reform work is difficult.
Fortunately, it's a skill that can be learned. To help you along, we're reprinting below a newsletter column written by Grace Bauer, Community Organizer for the Campaign for Youth Justice. --Ed.

 
Strategies for Engaging Families in
Advocacy and System Reform Efforts
by Grace Bauer

• Teen alcohol and drug treatment is often paid for with funds from the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) funds. So it was especially good news to hear that 4 million more children will be covered by the federal program.

• No word on who the permanent new Drug Czar will be. In the mean time, an interim Drug Czar was named by Obama.

• Even alcohol and drug policy groups at the state level can be subject to politics: in New Jersey, the State Comptroller audited the Governor's Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse for the first time in its 20-year existence, and said its $10 million budget would never produce "measurable results."

Recently, we asked you to take a survey, in order to address some basic questions:

• At what point in the legal process do you screen youth for alcohol and drug use/abuse? 
• What screening tool are you using? How well do you think it works?
• If you perform pre-adjudication screenings, how do you make sure the results do not interfere with the rights of the child in court?

Thanks to all who participated, so we can present our extremely unscientific results.

In my work with juvenile justice agencies and drug treatment professionals, I still hear people call cannabis (or marijuana) a "gateway" drug. This is one of those notions that just won't go away despite the availability of good information that disproves it.