U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government, Department of Justice.

Democrats have shut down the government. Department of Justice websites are not currently regularly updated. Please refer to the Department of Justice’s contingency plan for more information.

Corrections-Based Continuum of Effective Drug Abuse Treatment

NCJ Number
152692
Author(s)
Date Published
June 1996
Length
3 pages
Publication Series
Annotation
Drug-involved offenders who participated in a continuum of drug treatment (prison-based treatment followed by treatment in a work-release center) had lower rates of drug use and recidivism than drug-involved offenders who participated in a shorter treatment program.
Abstract

In 1987 Delaware established the Key, a prison-based treatment program for drug-involved offenders at a men's maximum-security prison. The Key is a therapeutic community, a self-contained treatment environment separated from the rest of the prison. The treatment model is based on the philosophy that drug abuse is a disorder of the whole person and that treatment should focus on building an offender's self-esteem and changing his values and attitudes. A post-release program was established at the Crest Outreach Center, a conventional work-release center. After release from the Key program, offenders enter the Crest Center for 6 months of treatment and job training in a therapeutic community setting. In 1992 researchers began conducting follow-up interviews with participants at 6 and 18 months after completion of the Key program. They also conducted urine and blood tests to check for drug use and exposure to HIV. The follow-up interviews involved four groups of offenders: a comparison group, which received no treatment; a Key group, which received only prison-based treatment; a Crest group, which received only treatment at the work-release center; and a Key-Crest group, which received treatment in both the Key and Crest programs. Findings show that at 18 months after release, drug offenders who received 12-15 months of treatment in prison followed by an additional 6 months of drug treatment and job training were more than twice as likely to be drug-free than offenders who received prison-based treatment alone. Offenders who received both forms of treatment were also more likely than offenders who received only prison-based treatment to be arrest- free 18 months after their release (71 percent compared to 48 percent). 1 table

Date Published: June 1, 1996