Substance addiction is a complex disease that can cut short the life of many if attempts are not made to cure the disease. There are various treatments that have been developed or proclaimed as the cure to addiction and yes, some are truly effective while others are just hype.
Before we proceed any further, it is important to understand that no single treatment is effective for all types of addiction, and effective treatment does not focus solely on the patient’s drug addiction. Rather, it seeks to correct all areas of the person’s life. It is also highly recommended that once a treatment is chosen for a patient, it should be reviewed periodically to assess suitability to the patient’s condition.
Without further ado, let’s dive into 6 treatment methods that have proven powerful for treating addiction problems. Also, get here for the best substance abuse treatment.
- Detoxification: The DIY home detox is deemed to be dangerous and is not advisable for addicts. This is because you may experience life-threatening withdrawal symptoms and without the help of a trained specialist to help you, it may cause death. This is why medically-assisted detoxification is recommended as the first step in recovering from addiction as you will be in the care of professionals.
Detoxification seeks to rewire the brain from being dependent on the substance that caused addiction. The supply of the substance is stopped, while the first 90 days may seem difficult to live through as you will experience withdrawal in different forms, the experienced healthcare providers will be there to help you pull through.
- Medication: Medication is another powerful treatment to help reduce craving for the substance causing addiction and it is also used to manage withdrawal symptoms when a person is going through the detoxification phase. However, medications are not the first treatment model to use when treating an addict, and it will not be effective if it is used as a standalone treatment.
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): CBT seeks to help people recovering from addiction on how to recognize and change their thinking on substances that cause addiction. CBT is quite suitable for all addiction problems as it teaches people coping skills, how to prevent relapse, how to identify risky situations, and how to navigate such instances which are helpful for living an addiction-free life.
- Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT): the goal of REBT is to boost the power of the patient’s logical thinking. It helps patients recognize, challenge, and defeat self-defeating thoughts and feelings.
- Self-help group: In the words of a marketing guru, Seth Godin who is famous for saying things along the line of “People like us do things like this”, when people recovering from addiction join self-help groups where there are others like them, it eases the journey of recovery and when others share their success story it gives them hope that they can also share the same story.
- 12-step programs: This is a semi-structured therapy designed to help people abstain from drugs through a community-based effort.
