A framework for prevention

Abstract

Prevention activity often occurs at different levels of community and social network. At the smallest level it could occur among a group of drug users and their peers, at the largest level, it could take the form of international drug treaties and conventions. Clearly, there are a number of ways of facilitating changes at these different levels of community and social network. This paper describes a framework that has been used by the National Drug Research Institute. It is useful in explaining that various prevention activities can operate at different community levels and in different contexts, and describes their mechanisms of action. The framework borrows from, and adapts, the 'alcohol prevention conceptual model' of Holder and the 'conditional matrix' of Strauss and Corbin. The framework is limited in that it is not a fully conceptualized, data-based or theory-driven model that specifies how its elements relate to one another. Despite these limitations it has proved to be useful in planning, understanding and describing prevention activity.

Reducing alcohol use during pregnancy: listening to women who drink as an intervention starting point

“…In Australia, where diagnosis and notification of FAS/D are limited, there is a higher level of alcohol use among women of childbearing age and pregnant women (27,29), therefore Australia is likely to have a higher unrecorded level of FAS/D (26,29). To ensure optimal outcomes for infants and children in the future, multiple levels of intervention are likely to be required, focusing on programmes, laws and regulations that are based on evidence of impact (30). However, the minutiae of intervention must also involve information gained directly from the target group, as programmes that resonate with the target audience and meet their needs will be most effective in creating change (31).…”

Factors that enable and hinder the implementation of projects in the alcohol and other drug field

“…Evaluations of AOD and other health interventions attend to issues of implementation; however they usually concern one intervention type 1–4 . Other research provides theoretical rather than empirical analyses, offering useful typologies of factors that contribute to intervention success 5–9 . Drawing on this literature and on a heterogeneous sample of 127 AER Foundation funded projects, this study provides empirically‐based categories of barriers and enablers to project implementation ranked according to the frequency with which they occurred within the study sample.…”