Course Description:

I was well into my career as a psychiatrist, both clinical and administrative, when it sank in that well-over half the people who came to me for help had significant co-occurring substance use and mental disorders.

Sadly, what happens is that current assessment and treatment paradigms focus primarily on one problem or the other, leaving much unassessed, unaddressed, or ignored.

For anyone who has watched a client or family member struggle with drugs or alcohol, achieve abstinence in a rehab facility, only to relapse within days to weeks after discharge, this point is made fresh. What happened? They were doing so well. What happened is that their anxiety, depression, impulsivity, and so forth, led to urges and cravings that they were unequipped to manage. In the millisecond it took for their mind to connect a first drink, pill, snort, or shot of heroin to a reduction in anxiety and other negative emotions, a month’s worth of 12-step became nothing but a memory.

All of which led me to want a consistent and effective approach to assess and work with individuals with any number of co-occurring combinations. It’s clear that what we need for the homeless woman, with intravenous opioid use and schizoaffective disorder, is different from the insurance executive who sucks down a daily fifth of whiskey to keep his anxiety and panic at bay, or the teen who cuts herself and misuses her brother’s stimulants to both decrease her appetite, and her overwhelming feelings of sadness and emptiness.

This day-long training provides practical assessment and treatment strategies, which can be deployed across the co-occurring continua. Whether you are an administrator who creates interventions at the system level, or a rubber-meets-the-road clinician, the step-by-step approaches we will discuss and use (lots of case studies) will give you the tools you need to both improve and track your clinical outcomes.