Efficacy of a Stress Management Module in Managing Stress and Clean Time in Dual Diagnosis (Mental Illness and Substance Misuse) Clients

Abstract

A 1-year pilot quasi-experimental efficacy study of the Stress Management for Recovery Module (SM) was performed with 37 dual diagnosis (DD) clients from a DD outpatient clinic in the United States. It was hypothesized that clients who received the SM would show more improvement in their ability to manage stress and clean time than controls and when compared to themselves before and after the SM intervention. Outcome data showed that clients who received the SM learned new material and used it to make changes in their lives. Results from paired sample t tests demonstrated that clients who received the SM showed a significant improvement in their number of clean days during intervention as compared to before (p = 0.008). Clients showed a significant improvement in their knowledge of stress after the intervention as compared to before (pre-versus post-test) (p = 0.033), but there was no significant difference when compared to the control group. These results indicate that this SM is an effective method for improving stress management skills and clean time in DD clients at this clinic and a need for future randomized and controlled experimentation.