Future Strategies on the Treatment of Drug Addiction. Psychotherapeutic Work with the Families of Substance Abusers. Thoughts from Europe

Abstract

When we talk about drugs, we are talking about individuals and substances in a dynamic and interrelated context, of individuals from the inner gaze and from the gaze to the outside; the individuals from within (neurophysiological characteristics, personal history, personality make-up), and the individuals from external factors (transforming effect) and about our inner selves and those of others, scrutinizing and establishing factors in time, space, and history. Care models in the field of addictions along with a profound understanding of the phenomenon have evolved in parallel with the social perception of drug-taking. The aims of the treatments are overlapped by the expectations that the users attribute to the effects of the substance. Drug-taking should be seen as a message from the individual that transmits essential elements of his or her self and of their context. The existing tensions between the needs of the patient, their frames of reference such as family, educative environment, and peer group along with the physical and mental health complications create a therapeutic workspace where it is possible to develop intervention strategies on a per case basis. Care providers are today faced with four groups of substance users battling for the available resources in the field of drug dependency. We shall be monitoring the development of the therapeutic intervention for these groups from a systemic perspective, defining the stages for organization of interventions.

WE RESIGN OURSELVES TO SEEING OURSELVES THROUGH THE OTHER’S EYES

(J. P. SARTRE)