Promising Results for Cross-Systems Collaborative Efforts to Meet the Needs of Families Impacted by Substance Use.

This study is based on data regarding more than 15,000 families served by 53 federal grantees showing that child safety and permanency, parental recovery, and family well-being improve when agencies work together to address the complex needs of families at the intersection of substance abuse treatment and child welfare. Strategies summarized here offer promising collaborative approaches to mitigate the negative outcomes too often experienced by families impacted by substance use disorders.

New Approaches for Working with Children and Families Involved in Family Treatment Drug Courts: Findings from the Children Affected by Methamphetamine Program.

This is a descriptive study of the Children Affected by Methamphetamine (CAM) grant program, a federally funded effort to improve outcomes through the addition of targeted interventions for 1,940 families, including 2,596 adults and 4,245 children involved in 12 diverse Family Treatment Drug Courts (FTDCs) located across six U.S. states. The majority were children of parents with a primary methamphetamine use disorder. Findings reflect grantees' reporting on 18 performance indicators of child safety and permanency, adult recovery, and family well-being. Additional information gleaned from grantees' biannual reports provides insights about program implementation. Results, drawn from this large and complex dataset, indicate that comprehensively addressing families' needs is associated with better outcomes than those experienced by similarly situated families in grantees' communities and the nation overall. In addition to describing common program components and outcomes, this article presents important lessons learned about implementing evidence-based children's services in the FTDC context, as well as future directions for research and evaluation in this arena.

Perceptions of parental substance use disorders in cross-system collaboration among child welfare, alcohol and other drugs, and dependency court organizations.

Cross-system collaboration among child welfare (CW), alcohol and other drugs (AOD), and court organizations shows promise in addressing the many needs of CW-involved families experiencing parental substance use disorders (SUDs). Research has suggested that differing perceptions of parents with SUDs among staff in these organizations may hinder the collaborative process. Using a sequential explanatory mixed-method approach, this study explored staff perceptions of parental SUDs among CW, AOD, and court organizations. Logistic regression analyses indicated that, compared to CW respondents, AOD respondents were: (a) less likely to believe that parents could provide effective parenting; (b) more likely to believe that abstinence should be a criterion for reunification; (c) more likely to agree that parents should receive jail time as a consequence for noncompliance with court orders; and (d) more likely to believe that parents could succeed in treatment. Thematic analyses of these focal areas identified two core themes (focus on the primary client and mandated time frames for permanency), as well as multiple subthemes, that provided a nuanced understanding of differing perceptions on these matters. Suggestions for the development of anticipatory cross-system training and practices and implications for policy evaluation are discussed.

Parental substance use disorders and child maltreatment: overlap, gaps, and opportunities.

There are relatively few empirically sound studies or nationally representative data on the number of children in Child Welfare Services (CWS) who are affected by their parents' substance abuse or dependence. The two systems that could systematically monitor this population, CWS and substance abuse treatment, are not required to capture the data elements that would identify families in both systems. The studies that are based on CWS populations or parents in treatment indicate that there is a substantial overlap in client populations. This review provides a summary of the available data; provides estimates of the overlap between populations, including the number of infants born each year with prenatal substance exposure; and suggests important opportunities to close the data gap between the systems. The findings underscore both the need for obtaining accurate data within the systems and the opportunities for states to improve their cross-system data efforts as part of their outcome monitoring.

The Sacramento Dependency Drug Court: development and outcomes.

Dependency Drug Courts (DDCs) are a growing method of addressing the functional status and reunification success of families involved in child welfare and affected by substance use disorders. Despite widespread interest in DDCs, few evaluations have appeared in the literature to help inform the discussion about their effectiveness. This article provides a description of various types of DDCs and reports 24-month reunification rates from the Sacramento DDC. Results indicated that DDC participants had higher rates of treatment participation than did comparison participants. In addition, at 24 months, 42% of the DDC children had reunified versus 27.2% of the comparison children. There were no differences in treatment completion or child reunification rates by parent's primary drug problem. Rates of recidivism were extremely low for both the DDC and comparison groups and did not differ significantly. The results of the present study are encouraging and suggest that rigorous, controlled studies are merited to further evaluate the effectiveness of DDCs.