Anyone entering a rehab is likely to be referred to as an addict.
This is in one sense a bit of a label, in another sense anyone entering a rehab is looking for help or treatment with one or more addictions, either to alcohol, drugs, gambling, food or a combination thereof.
Inevitably, a rehab or treatment center will offer a wide range of treatment addiction programs, normally based upon the 12th program of Alcoholics Anonymous, as a way of helping the individual overcome any or all of these addictions.
This approach may work for some people, may be helpful to some people and unhelpful for other people.
When treatment centers first came into being they were essentially hospitals and detox units for people who had a problem with alcohol, such people commonly referred to as alcoholics.
Truman centers then began to work with and help people who had other addictions such as narcotics and prescription drugs, and would refer to these people as being dual addicted.
Over time people were admitted to rehabs and treatment centers who were not only alcoholics, but had other problems as well.
REHAB ADDICT TREATMENT
Treatment centers quickly realised that they could effectively treat anyone who had any addiction to anything, if they focused their efforts on the person, and treated their addictive substance or behaviour as ‘a drug of choice’.
Whether this approach was based on clinical evidence or not is unclear, but it did allow a significant growth in the number and scope of treatment centers and rehabs.
The potential problem with this approach, and the categorisation of everyone as an addict, is that it can be a slight distortion of an individual’s reality.
Dealing with the underlying emotional causes that can fuel someone’s alcoholism or addiction to drugs or other substances is inevitably going to be helpful, but it can also distort reality of what an individual’s problems with that substance or behaviour actually are.
There is a danger of fine tuning reality to fit a model that suits the finances and growth of the treatment center industry.
That is not to say that the majority of rehab’s and treatment centres do not approach that addiction treatment programs correctly, the majority of them do.
What is important is that any addiction treatment program at a rehab treatment center offers is based on solid clinical evidence and on solid therapeutic evidence such as the process of the 12 step program of Alcoholics Anonymous.