The one of mission of universal prevention program is to deter the onset of drug abuse by providing all individuals in a population with the information and skills necessary to prevent the problem. All members of the population share the same general risk for drug abuse, although the risk may vary greatly among individuals. Universal prevention programs are delivered to large groups without any prior screening for drug abuse risk status of the individual program recipients. The entire population is assumed at-risk for substance abuse. For example substance abuse education in schools, media and public awareness. (Red Ribbon Week, Alcohol Awareness Month)
Selective prevention targets specific subgroups of the population that are believed to be at greater risk than others. Age, gender, family history, place of residence (i.e., high drug use, or low-income neighborhoods) and victimization, or physical and/or sexual abuse may define the targeted subgroups. Selective prevention targets the entire subgroup regardless of the degree of risk of any individual within the group. One individual in the subgroup may not be at personal risk for substance abuse, whereas another individual in the same subgroup may be abusing substances. The selective prevention program is presented to the entire subgroup because the subgroup as a whole is at higher risk for substance abuse than the general population. An individual’s personal risk is not specifically assessed or identified and is based solely on a presumption given in his or her membership in the at-risk subgroup.
For instance skills training for groups affected by environmental influences like high crime rate, unemployment and community disorganization.
Indicated prevention approaches are...
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• Indicated prevention strategies require a precise assessment of an individual’s personal risk and level of related problem behaviors, rather than relying on the person’s membership in an at-risk group as in the selected approach.
• Programs are frequently extensive and highly intensive; they typically operate for longer periods of time, at a greater frequency of contact and require greater effort on the part of participants than do selective or universal programs.
• Programs require highly skilled staff who have clinical training, counseling and other skills. In the field of substance abuse, an indicated prevention intervention would be a substance abuse program for high school students who are experiencing a number of problem behaviors, including truancy, failing academic grades, juvenile depression, suicidal ideation, and early signs of substance abuse.
Robertson, E. B., David, S. L., Rao, S. A., & National Institute on Drug Abuse (2003). Preventing drug use among children and adolescents: A research based guide for parents, educators, and community leaders (2nd ed.). Bethesda, Md: U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health, National Institute on Drug Abuse.
34 Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Risk and Protective Factors for Adolescent Drug Use: Finding From the 1997 National Household Survey on Drug Abuse. Accessed: http://www.samhsa.gov. 3 May 2002.
The public health model differs from traditional health practices, as its focus is on the health of the public instead of one patient. It uses a “3 prong approach to prevention and intervention” “known as the agent, host, and the environment.” This is because threats to public health require a susceptible host, an infectious agent, and a supportive environment that allows the spread of infection. By doing this, professionals are able to develop preventions against issues of public health. This would include teaching children to say no to drugs at a young age in order to prevent addiction in the future, as they are susceptible hosts to becoming addicts. Also making drugs illegal to keep the agent from being accessible to people who could become addicts. The approach is useful in all areas of public health, and has been proven to intervene in the likeliness that something will become
Owen JM. Program evaluation : forms and approaches / by John M. Owen: St Leonards, N.S.W. : Allen & Unwin, 2006.
Intervention needs to be tailored to the child’s needs, and effort needs to be placed on restoring the child to normal or optimal state of mental health or behavior adjustment. Intervention needs to focus on problem-solving and cognitive skills, so that children with behavioral problems learn to adjust to, deal with, or resolve conflicting and traumatic factors. Skill development is an essential ingredient of lifestyle intervention.
With such statistical information it is unsurprising that governments have not fully embraced the harm reduction concept, with some countries reverting back to older methods. For instance, Canada is on the verge of closing the dangerous In-site injection facility in Vancouver and reallocating funds to traditional inpatient treatment--real treatment that promotes eventual abstinence. One can conclude that the effectiveness of harm reduction is a very questionable topic as not only does it aid in offender substance abuse, but at what cost. The topic of harm reduction provokes a deeper thought, what happened to prevention methods and what about them is not working?
There are many contributing factors and political issues that address substance abuse. Throughout the years, many researchers have designed many interventions and social policies designed to treat people who have used, abused, and became addicted to substances. Today, there are many new studies that address substance abuse at the individual, group, family, and community or policy levels. Today, there are many services that are effective for decreasing recidivism in youth who have completed a substance abuse program. A substance abuse treatment program or center is the best way to treat individuals who have abused substances.
When we view substance use disorders, alcohol is the most widely used drug within the United States and 11 percent of workers have drinking problems (Frone, 2006). Over 20 million people used illegal substances in 2006 and 7 million people abused prescribed medications. Of the 18 million drug abusers, 18 years or older in 2006, 13.4 million (74.9 %) were employed full or part time (SAMHSA, OSA). These addiction problems have an expenditure of $276 billion dollars per year with most of this cost from loss of productivity and health care (H. Harwood, D. Fountain, and G. Livermore, 1992).
National Institute on Drug Abuse (2009). Preventing Drug Abuse: The Best Strategy . Retrieved October 21, 2011, from http://www.nida.nih.gov/scienceofaddiction/strategy.html
The war on drugs and the violence that comes with it has always brought around a hot debate about drug legalization. The amount of violence that is associated with drugs is a result from harsher drug laws and prohibition.
It has become increasingly evident over the past 25 years that there is a need for
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, (n.d.). Risk and protective factors. Retrieved from http://www.samhsa.gov/capt/practicing-effective-prevention/prevention-behavioral-health/risk-protective-factors
High school students are leaders to younger kids and many others in their community. As a leader these student must show others what good character is like, but instead they are destroying their lives by doing drugs. In the past decade the drug use among high school students is on the rise once again. With the internet, their exposure to drugs is much greater. High school students are convinced that they are able to get away with using drugs. These drug addicts soon influence other students into doing the drugs because there isn’t a rule preventing drug use. In order to protect these student’s future, drug tests must be enforced among all students ensuring a safe environment for students to learn successfully. Allowing random drug testing in high schools will shy away students from trying these harmful drugs. The stop of drug use among high school students is crucial because drugs prevents student from learning leading them to dropping out of high school. Students that become overwhelmed by these harmful drugs will ruin their lives forever, but if steered in the right direction they can be saved.
Perhaps most substance abuse starts in the teen years when young people are susceptible to pressure from their peers. One of the main concerns when dealing with substance abuse is the long term problems with substance such as addiction, dependency and tolerance. The physical state of an individual, who is addicted to a substance, will deteriorate over a long period of time. This is due to the chemicals that are being put into an individual body. One of the most important aspects of the effect of substance abuse on society includes ill health, disease, sickness, and in many cases death. The impact of substance abuse not only affects individuals who abuse substances but it affects our economy. Our government resources are negatively impacted by individual who abuse substances. According to (Lagliaro 2004) the implication of drug users extend far beyond the user, often damaging their relationships with their family, community, and health workers, volunteer and wider
There is still ongoing research about the most effective program to reduce recidivisms and prevent delinquent behaviors. Prevention program helps children and family in many ways, including bullying, helping young mothers, life skill training programs, and school based programs like STATUS and STEP. Community based intervention helps those that are in probation or out of the juvenile justice system. community intervention programs provide family therapy and work with the family or caretaker of the offender. Also, Intensive Protective Supervision (IPS) is a program where juveniles that caused non-serious offense are supervised by a case manager. Even though these programs have shown to be effective and are available for everyone. The population that needs these kinds of services, most are the minority and those that are