Drug Abuse Treatment ― The Implementation of Innovative Approaches

This collection reports on the progress of the intervention programs first described in Innovative Approaches in the Treatment of Drug Abuse: Program Models and Strategies (Inciardi and Fletcher, 1993). By examining the implementation of treatment initiatives, this study focuses on an area often neglected in the research literature: the context in which research is conducted. Applied researchers, particularly those who study users of illicit drugs, face many obstacles that investigators working in more controlled settings, or with more predictable and compliant subjects, often do not encounter. These accounts demonstrate the challenges in producing rapid improvement in treatment for the vulnerable and underserved population of drug abusers. A close study of these efforts will be useful to other researchers in planning for and solving implementation problems that can be anticipated, and in providing guidelines and strategies to overcome those that cannot.

BENNETT W. FLETCHER's primary work at the National Institute on Drug Abuse has been in developing large-scale longitudinal drug treatment evaluation research, including theDrug Abuse Treatment Outcome Study. He is the co-editor of Innovative Approaches in the Treatment of Drug Abuse (Greenwood, 1993).

JAMES A. INCIARDI is director of the Center for Drug and Alcohol Studies and Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice at the University of Delaware. He is the co-editor ofInnovative Approaches in the Treatment of Drug Abuse (Greenwood, 1993), editor ofHandbook of Drug Control in the United States (Greenwood, 1990), and author of more than 130 articles, chapters, and books in the areas of criminal justice, substance abuse, history, folklore, criminology, medicine, law, public policy, and AIDS.

ARTHUR M. HORTON is a research psychologist/project officer in the Treatment Research Branch of the Division of Clinical Research of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He has held faculty appointments at the University of Maryland Medical School, Johns Hopkins University, West Virginia University, and the University of Virginia. The author or editor of four books, his most recent contribution was the edited volumeNeuropsychology Across the Life-span: Assessment and Treatment (1990).