Enhancing services for offenders: the impact on treatment completion

Because of high drop out rates, it is important to determine if enhancing standard substance treatment services will impact treatment completion rates among those in need of specialized services who are involved in the criminal justice system. The purpose of this research was to understand the impact of providing mental health services and gender-specific services for women in a modified therapeutic community setting. In the study, those who received mental health services and/or gender-specific treatment services, in additional to the substance abuse services, had similar rates of treatment completion as compared to those who received only substance abuse services. Logistic regression results indicated that controlling for other variables, age and length of time using one's primary drug were the only statistically significant predictors of treatment completion. The results suggest that the treatment model described in this article is a potentially cost-effective method of maximizing existing resources for treating substance abusing criminal offenders in community-based treatment settings.