Treatment Research

A Rapid Teen Substance Use Screening Tool for Clinicians

Answers to three simple questions can help a busy health care provider flag a teen’s problematic use of alcohol, tobacco, or marijuana.

Electronic Questionnaire Quickly Rates Teens’ Substance Use

With a few simple questions, a new screening tool detects whether a teen is likely to have a mild-to-moderate or a severe substance use disorder.

Text Messaging Aftercare Intervention Cuts Youths’ Risk for Relapse

An interactive mobile texting aftercare program has shown promise as a means to help teens and young adults engage with post-treatment recovery activities and avoid relapse. The program reduced young people’s odds of relapsing by half compared with standard aftercare.

Study Points to Individualized Therapy for Opioid Addiction

Trial participants who were addicted to opioid painkillers and did not inject drugs stayed in treatment longer and achieved better outcomes than those who were addicted to heroin or injected drugs.

Expanded HIV Screening Projected To Decrease Spread of the Virus

Intensified screening for HIV among injection drug users receiving opioid agonist therapy could prevent more than twice as many new infections as current screening practice, NIDA-supported researchers estimate. The findings from the recent study suggest that screening every 6 months instead of annually, and adding viral RNA testing to the currently used HIV antibody testing, could improve both effectiveness and cost-effectiveness (see Figure 1). The benefits would accrue from flagging new infections and initiating treatment sooner. Figure 1. More Frequent and Expanded Screening for HIV

California Reaped Large Savings by Diverting Drug-Using Offenders Into Treatment

A California law that allows qualified drug offenders to enter substance use treatment rather than go to jail or prison saved the state close to $100 million in its first year, NIDA-supported researchers report. Dr. M. Douglas Anglin and colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles estimated that California spent an average of $2,300 less on each of 42,000 offenders who were adjudicated under its Substance Abuse and Crime Prevention Act of 2000 (SACPA; also known as Proposition 36) than it would have spent without the Act. The savings mainly reflected reduced spending on

Study Parses Comorbidity of Cannabis Use and Social Anxiety

A recent large-scale epidemiological study sheds light on the relationship between cannabis use disorder (CUD) and social anxiety disorder (SAD). The findings affirmed that a significant portion of individuals with CUD also have SAD, and showed that comorbid SAD is associated with greater severity of cannabis-related problems. Moreover, almost all individuals with both CUD and SAD had at least one additional clinically significant psychiatric disturbance. The researchers say that their findings highlight the importance of assessing CUD patients for SAD. Their evidence suggests that SAD can be

Words matter: language can reduce mental health and addiction stigma, NIH leaders say

Appropriate terminology can improve how people with these conditions are treated in health care settings and society

NIH HEAL Initiative: Research Meets the Moment to Address the Opioid Public Health Crisis

Directors highlight research results from NIH-funded science and community partnerships

Effective Treatments for Opioid Addiction

This brief fact sheet provides information about the effectiveness of medications for opioid use disorders and recent scientific advances in this area.

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