Services research outcomes study: overview of drug treatment population and outcomes.

The study examined a representative sample of the 1,060,000 individuals discharged from drug user treatment in the United States in the 12 months before September 1990, and compared self-reports of behavior 5 years before to 5 years after treatment. Self-reports about recent drug use were compared with urine samples, and the agreement between self-report and drug-test results was high. The key findings are that the number of alcohol and drug users declined markedly, ranging from one-seventh to more than one half; those who continued using drugs after treatment used them less frequently than before treatment; criminal behavior fell between one-quarter to one-half, and primary criminal support fell by one third; full-time employment did not change; homelessness, drug injection, and suicide attempts decreased by more than one-third.

Services research outcomes study: explanation of treatment effectiveness, using individual-level and programmatic variables.

This article examines the explanatory power of programmatic and individual-level variables, using the first nationally representative sample of both treatment facilities and clients. Multivariate statistical models accounted for almost half the variance in post-treatment heroin, marijuana, and any illicit drug use and about one-third the variance in crime. Use of any illicit drug during treatment, even after controlling for pretreatment use, was predictive of every type of drug use after treatment and three of the four major crimes analyzed. In addition, longer lengths of stay decreased the likelihood of alcohol/illicit drug use and criminal behavior after treatment. However, treatment variables added little explanatory power beyond the sociodemographic and pre-treatment variables.