A review of empirical literature reveals improvements in service utilization and outcomes for women when substance abuse and child welfare services are integrated. The increased use of substances by women involved in the child welfare system has resulted in a call for integrated, coordinated, evidence-based practices. Since the late 1990s, specific system-and service-level strategies have been developed to coordinate and integrate the provision of substance abuse and child welfare services such that women are remaining in treatment longer and are more likely to reduce substance use and be reunited with their children. The strategies reviewed provide useful guidelines for developing components of effective, evidence-based programs for substanceinvolved women in the child welfare system. Keywords integrated services; substance abuse; child welfare; wome Estimates of the percentage of parents involved in the child welfare system with serious substance abuse problems range as high as 50-80% and have resulted in a variety of service models and service system modifications to address the problem of parental substance abuse in child welfare. More than 10 years ago, Young, Gardner, and Dennis (1998) outlined the challenges associated with identifying and meeting the service needs of substance abusing parents in the child welfare system. Aspects of the challenges those authors identified remain, but a growing body of evidence now demonstrates that improvements in child welfare service utilization and outcomes result when substance abuse and child welfare services are integrated within the same service setting. Child welfare service systems have identified strategies at both the systems level and the service delivery levels to integrate services, including collaborative working relationships with substance abuse treatment and child welfare administrators and service providers, child welfare worker training to better identify substance abuse problems, processes to facilitate parents' entry and engagement in substance abuse treatment, and working relationships with family courts

In an attempt to reduce homelessness and substance abuse, Chicago graduates of short-term inpatient substance abuse programs who lacked domiciles were placed into one of three conditions: (1) a case management only intervention (n = 96), (2) a case management with supported housing intervention (n = 136), or (3) a control condition (n = 187) that allowed access to normal aftercare in the community. The two treatment interventions used a "progressive independence" approach, which focuses on simultaneously ameliorating tangible needs and clinical problems. Multivariate analyses suggest that subjects in both treatment interventions experienced lower levels of substance abuse and higher levels of residential stability than subjects in the control condition, as measured over the course of a year. Further analysis suggests that retention was improved by the focus on immediate tangible resources, substance abuse was reduced by both the support of outpatient substance abuse treatment and the promulgation of changes in coping styles, and residential stability was increased by both the focus on access to income maintenance benefits and help with location of housing.

No abstract

No abstract