Enhance Treatment and Recovery Support During Incarceration

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Key Information

Prison treatment programs have been successful, and there are clear benefits to them. Well-designed prison treatment programs reduce relapse, criminality, inmate misconduct and recidivism. They also increase levels of education, mend relationships, boost employment opportunities upon release and improve overall health. Cost-benefit analysis indicates that residential prison treatment is cost-effective if prisoners continue treatment after their release. There are immediate and long-term fiscal benefits. In a direct and immediate cost comparison, the cost of treatment pales in comparison to the cost of incarceration. In a longer-term vantage point, when prisoners overcome drug use, it reduces the economic burden of recidivism.

In general, the criminal justice system supports treatment during incarceration by offering inmates with substance use problems a mix of psychotherapy sessions, religious ministry meetings, and 12-step programs, such as Alcoholics Anonymous. The federal prison system utilizes four primary types of programs to assist inmates in overcoming a substance use disorder:

• The Residential Drug Abuse Program (RDAP) is the most intensive program that the Federal Bureau of Prisons will provide and is normally nine months in length. Inmates in this program live in their own separate community from the rest of the population. Inmates take part in daily half-day programming and a half-day of work, school, or vocational activities. Research has shown that inmates that take part in RDAP are significantly less likely to recidivate and relapse to drug use compared to those inmates who do not take part in RDAP.

• Nonresidential Drug Abuse Treatment. This involves a 12-week cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) program that is organized in group sessions that address criminal lifestyles while increasing skills in the areas of rational thinking, communication, and institution-to-community adjustment. Inmates that are enrolled in this program normally have short sentences, do not meet the Residential Drug Abuse Program, are waiting to be enrolled in RDAP, are in transition back into the community or have a positive urinalysis test

• Drug Abuse Education entails a series of classes that educate inmates on substance use disorder and the effects it has on your body and mind.

• Community Treatment Services (CTS) provides continued care to inmates who have been released and put into Residential Reentry Centers or on Home Confinement. Evidence shows that the period after being released is the most vulnerable time for inmates to relapse back to drug use or criminal activity. So, continued treatment after release is vital to the success of the offender completing their treatment.