Finding a good quality drug or alcohol rehab can make the difference between success and sobriety, and a wasted month or more and continuing abuse; and it's too bad that such a crucial decision comes at a time in life when few are at their best, and capable of making a rational and researched decision.
With all the choices out there, and so much of the information on the internet biased and commercial, getting the information you need can be tough; and since the decision needs to be made quickly, doubly so.
As a starting point, here is a list of 5 things that you should consider warning signs of a poor quality rehab. Most rehabs do offer good quality programming and care, but there are some who exist for little else than to collect your admission checks. Many of these poor quality rehabs will exhibit on or more of these warning signs.
5 signs of a poor quality rehab
1 No or limited individual therapy.
Therapeutically, the biggest expense for most rehabs is the operation of an individual therapy program. Individual sessions with a therapist or psychologist are very expensive, and as a cost savings measure, some rehabs will offer either no or very little individual therapy.
Individual therapy is enormously beneficial, and you should be wary of any rehab that minimizes it importance.
2 No family involvement
Family should be invited to participate actively in the therapies and seminars of rehab. Family therapy with a counselor, family group meetings and family educational seminars can all educate the family on how best to support an addict in recovery, and can also help to heal some of the family wounds that may be leading to abuse.
Rehabs that do not offer family involvement (again therapy cost savings) should be considered suspect.
3 The rehab is not accredited or certified
Some rehabs will try to avoid the expense of meeting certification requirements and run an uncertified program. Certified rehabs meet a minimum standard of care, their therapies are approved, and they must hire professional and licensed experts. Non certified facilities may do pretty much whatever they like.
Some may boast of non accreditation as a means to offer cutting-edge therapy or programs, but this is probably just a positive spin on a very bad sign.
4 They have a too impressive success rate.
If the rehab boasts of an 80-90% success rate, or speaks of "curing" participants, they should be avoided. No rehab can offer such incredible success rates (about rehab success rates) and if they mislead on that, can they be trusted on anything else they say?
5 Using one form of therapy exclusively
It's OK for a rehab program to focus on one form of therapy as primary, but additional and complimentary therapies and education should be offered as well. No some form of therapy works well for all addicts in recovery, and to have the best chance of success, you need to learn a number of tools towards sobriety.
No Relapse! 3 ways to stay sober after drug or alcohol rehab
Drug or alcohol rehab is unfortunately no guarantee of long term sobriety, and a great many people fail to see sobriety through the end of the first very risky year after rehab. Here are three things you can do to maximize the odds of staying sober and staying healthy after the end of drug or alcohol rehab.
Insomnia can lead to relapse. 8 ways to get to sleep at night; even while going through withdrawal!
We don’t often think of sleep as a risk factor to relapse and abuse, but insomnia during long term withdrawal is a significant predictor of further abuse. This is very problematic as one of the symptoms of long term withdrawal off of a great many drugs is a prolonged period of sleep disturbances. Here are 8 ways to get to sleep at night, even while going through withdrawal.
Alcoholism; 3 ways family can help a recovering alcoholic stay sober
You can never fight the battles of alcoholism recovery for someone you love, but that doesn’t mean that family can't help a lot on the road to sobriety. Although the recovering alcoholic must walk the lonely road to sobriety alone, there are three concrete actions that a loving and supportive family can take to help out along the way.
