Years ago I attended a conference where I first learned of the work of Dean Fixsen and heard the phrase implementation science. What I most remember about his presentation is a PowerPoint slide he showed that to this day continues to haunt me: The table is taken from Joyce and Showers (2002) where the authors… [Continue Reading]
Improving Effectiveness of DUII Treatment
This past Friday I had the honor of speaking to the Oregon house and senate committees on Judiciary about the effectiveness of Oregon’s DUII reduction approach. My friend and colleague, Heidi Brockman-Astrue, joined me to also share her experience as someone working in the trenches daily treating DUII offenders. One reason for our testimony, is that… [Continue Reading]
Investing in Addiction Treatment: Is it Worth the Cost?
I recently talked with a Huffington Post reporter about the Real Tab for Rehab: Inside the Addiction Treatment Biz. In our discussion, I pointed out that to a large extent we still have an addiction treatment system that provides short-term (acute) treatment for a long-term (chronic) problem (this key point did not make the article). In… [Continue Reading]
The Gap Between Research & Practice
Each year our government spends approximately: $95 billion dollars on research to develop new treatments (medical, behavioral, psychiatric, addiction) $1.3 trillion dollars a year on actual services to patients Yet sadly, less than $1 billion dollars a year is spent on understanding how to take what we learn from science and research – the new… [Continue Reading]