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RE: Dry January Day #13: Evidence Based Recovery and Addiction - 2,336 Days Sober

in #addiction7 years ago

Great job on helping people sort through the morass of Google ad-junk on recovery! Evidence based treatment practices, while effective in many situations, are not the only solution to an individual's addiction issues. Just like a 12-Step, faith-based, or Cognitive Behavioral Approach may not be the only option either. My experience in the addiction industry as a Substance Abuse Counselor has taught me that it is often a combination of approaches that works best. Let's face it, scientific studies at one time or another in the past, have endorsed smoking as a healthy stress reducer (back in the 1950's) and the USDA Food Pyramid as a healthy diet. Each person's addiction issues are unique and require a creative combination of empathetic modalities for treatment. Sometimes evidence based treatment is combined with 12-Step programs. In other cases, complete abstinence is the only approach. For some, faith based programs work. The point is I have seen all of these approaches fail and succeed. It is dangerous to say that evidence based treatment is the only way to recover.