Effectiveness from follow-up outcomes of eight substance abuse treatment programs in Greece.

Backgound: The first phase of treatment effectiveness through follow-up systematic measures from participants to KETHEA – main national component of the Greek national drug treatment network services – treatment agencies has been concluded during the second Covid-19 wave restrains. Main purpose of the study was to examine outcome results to all kind of participants in respect to their response to provided treatment plan in respect of each different therapeutic stage: preparation and induction, early engagement phase to intensive treatment and advanced recovery support. Findings will provide recommendations to clinical and political challenges that contribute to on-going efforts of an effective continuum of care.

Methods: Cascade methodology on sampling selection procedures were implemented in order to ensure inclusion of all different participants’ performance. Three different sub samples were designed based on participants’ treatment compliance; a. treatment seekers who never proceeded to intensive care at least during the follow-up period, b. participants who started intensive residential or outpatient treatment with no completion treatment plan suggested because they discharge from the full program components, and c. those who received full intensive treatment. Total sample consisted of 706 treatment participants randomly selected on subgroup criteria, from a total of eight different therapeutic programs during the last 5 years. Restrictive measures for the dispersion of Covid-19 gave the opportunity to locate participants and implement telephone interviews based on ASI (Addiction Severity Index) European version questionnaire adaptation. Data collection took place during March 2021 until July 2021. Five critical areas were examined such as, substance use patterns, health issues, illegal activities, employment performance and family and social relationships. In addition understanding factors that deter the decision of first group to engage to the intensive treatment were investigated along as substance use behavior in comparison to their before treatment seeking attitudes.

Results: Research findings clarify outcomes’ differences in between groups to almost all clusters of variables examined such as demographic characteristics, chronicity and severity of substance use, illegal behavior, employments rates, and prosocial activation. Substantial improvements on health, employment and legal issues on all groups were measured, although it appears that participants who didn’t receive full treatment reduced the substance use after a significant period of time.

Conclusions: The results underline significant changes not only for those who have received the full treatment plan, but also for those who only received a little dose of initial support even if this improvement is related to explainable characteristics and patterns such as age, type of substance and perceptions on provided treatment. However passage from a drug treatment program showed that has positive effect on every aspect of the critical areas examined.