06/13/09 - ATIN - After drug marketer Cephalon spent $250M marketing the ant-craving medication VIVITROL over two years and only succeeded in driving annual sales to $20M or so, the pioneering drug's developer, Alkermes, in January took complete control over VIVITROL. In an innovative move designed to boost sales, Alkermes a couple of months ago began offering the first dose of VIVITROL free to anyone who applied.

Based in Cambridge, MA, Alkermes is part of a growing group of biotech concerns that specialize in innovative drug "delivery" systems. In the case of VIVITROL it involved taking the drug naltrexone, an opioid receptor antagonist FDA approved for the treatment of alcoholism and opiate addiction, and adding a drug delivery mechanism that allows for one dose to last an entire month, thus ensuring patient compliance with drug treatment regimens. With VIVITROL, the delivery mechanism is via a once-a-month injection into the muscle.

Cephalon, a company that was formed by Madison Avenue type Frank Baldino when drug marketing laws were loosened up almost two decades ago, fell down where other drug companies have also fallen down before when it comes to the nascent addictions drug sector, including Dupont with its Revia brand naltrexone drug in the 1980s. Assuming the addictions markets would be just like any other, Cephalon spent spent alot of time and effort marketing VIVITROL like it would any other drug, to physicians. But, as anyone who is familiar with the addiction treatment field knows, physicians are mostly not at all concerned about addiction and have very little involvement in its treatment. As a result, Cephalon spent vast sums to little effect.

Taking the advice of those who know the addictions industry intimately, Alkermes CEO David Broecker, along with newly appointed VIVITROL marketing chief Stephen King, have totally revamped and refocused the VIVITROL marketing effort, hiring almost 100 marketing staffers and offering innovative new approaches, with early results extremely promising.

At the core of Alkermes' effort is a new focus on marketing VIVITROL to treatment centers, which is where, after all, the addicts are. It is at treatment centers where Alkermes will find the most easliy accessed pool of acute alcoholics, which are also the alcoholics, precisely because they are in treatment, that are the ones also most likely to be the most willing participants in a VIVITROL regimen. The new marketing effort seeks to educate treatment center clinicians, the clinical directors and the medical directors, on the benefits and efficacy of integrating VIVITROL into their programs, making the medication a vital part of treatment at centers nationwide.

A key part of that mission is convincing clinicians, as well as insurance reimbursers, that $700 per dose VIVITROL is worth it. According to Alkermes insiders, the insurance reimbursers are increasingly onside as several major payors have conducted their own internal cost-benefit analyses and found VIVITROL saved substantial sums on the medical cost side as patients remain abstinent or reduced their drinking very substantially. And gold standard double-blind placebo scientific studies, like one conducted by Yale's Stephanie O'Malley, showed a massive decline in drinking by those in the study who used VIVITROL combined with psycho-social treatment, providing undeniable and dramatic clinical proof of the medication's efficacy.

Proof of the excitement surrounding the new VIVTROL marketing push at Alkermes is that former clinical personnel like Dr. Robert Forman have elected to join the marketing team in order to help get the message out about VIVITROL and ensure its commercial success. With sales failing to materialize under Cephalon's marketing stewardship, a frission of fear began to run through the rapidly growing pharma addiction research community. (At least 36 addiction drug compounds are in some stage of commercial development, by far the most in history.) The worries were justified as a failure by super high-profile VIVITROL would very likely have put a substantial damper on addictions R&D efforts at commercial drug companies, who would be fearful of having their stock prices punished by unfavorable Wall Street analyst views toward the nacsent drug sector.

Another example of successful approaches being taken by Alkermes are the series of increasingly well-attended VIVITROL seminars it is holding across the country to educate treatment centers and others in the addictions space. At one seminar, held in early June in Newton, MA, just outside of Boston, the amount of tables had to be doubled to accomdate overflowing attendees. At the seminar, Dr. Forman announced that the response had been so great to the offer of a free first dose of VIVITROL that Alkermes has had to hire an additional six employees just to handle the surging volume of applications.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

05/21/2009 - ATIN - The military's need for treatment services is surging as the rate at which alcohol and drugs are abused by rank and file soldiers continues to soar. This potentially creates a huge business opportunity for addiction treatment providers accross the nation, many of which have seen their census drop during this worst of all recessions since the Great Depression.

In an indication of the rate at which addiction is growing the in military, USA Today reported today that commanders are increasingly ingnoring when soldiers under their command test positive even multiple times for illegal mood altering substances. In a memo that USA Today said it obtained, the Army's vice chief of staff said that many soldiers who should be being referred to the Army Substance Abuse Program for help were not being referred by their commanders, who are afraid of losing key players under their command.

Liberty Management, a New Jersey-based treatment services provider with major operations in New York state, a couple of years ago began a program specifically aimed at garnering business from the military. Called the Liberty Homeland Support Network, Lberty Management marketing chief Roy Wallach has been actively seeking partners within the treatment industry, other treatment operators other than Liberty Management, to join its Homeland Support Network.

Liberty Management has signed up its Homeland Support Network as an approved provider for the giant military health insurance payor TRICARE.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

05/19/2009 - ATIN - A study published in Science Daily shows that drug and alcohol use spiked in the wake of terror attacks like the September 2001 Al Queada attack, but not as high as might be thought in the popular imagination.

The article said only about seven percent of respondants to the survey, which also included the Oklahoma City bombing (1995) and other terror events, reported an increase in drug and alcohol use in in the wake of traumatic events.

Here is the link to the Science Daily article:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090511101700.htm

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

05/15/2009 - ATIN - The addiction treatment industry mergers and acquisitions market has slowed to a crawl in recent months as the deepest recession to hit the nation since the Great Depression takes hold.

Industry M&A players say that there is plenty of talk going on between potential buyers and sellers - for example, CRC Health Corp, the nation's most active acquirer of treatment centers, is rumored to be courting Visions treatment center in California to compliment its existing Echo private pay adolescent treatment operation in the Malibu area.

But the mergers and acquisitions talk seems to be getting nowhere because the two sides seems to be far away on the always critical issue of pricing.

"Because of the recession, revenues at many centers have fallen and that has made buyers reluctant to step up and pay the kind of mulitples that existed in the marketplace a couple of years ago, they are afraid of overpaying," said one highly active treatment industry M&A player. "Buyers don't want to hear that multiples may have fallen, they still want their price."

Thus the M&A dance continues, with many active negotiations as many buyer and sellers cicle, according to industry mergers players.

And perhaps the principals of South Florida's The Watershed - which is rumored to have much lower census figures this year, although those appear to have improved markedly recently, according to company sources - now may regret that they did not accept previous very high bids for the company, rumored to be in the $120 million range.

One example of the stalled deal market is the bidding activity around Seafield Center, a highly desirable for profit treatment property located in the tony Hamptons north of New York City on Long Island. A multi-facted treatment operation with about $20 million a year in annual revenues, Seafield has been actively marketed by its founder and owner, real estate developer George Benedict. All to no avail though, as rumored firm bids from players like Hazelden and CRC have evaporated.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

05/15/2009 - ATIN - Subacute Holdings, one of the treatment industry's most aggresive mergers and acquisitions players, has changed its name to Elements Behavioral Health, which the company says is better reflective of the goals and aims of the company.

Says CEO David Sack, who was formerly chief medical officer at Aspen Education Grp, :  “We chose the name Elements because it reflects our belief that there is a fundamental, even elemental need, to fill the gap in between hospitalization and outpatient treatment,” Dr. Sack explained. “The elements of successful recovery from addiction and psychological disorders are often not met in the current treatment environment, where a level of service delivery has been lost for those people who may not need acute hospitalization, but who will not be successful if they only have the option of outpatient visits to a therapist or psychiatrist.”

Elements acquired the storied Promises treatment center last year, its first and only acquisition so far. Promises is a pioneer in in the development of the high-end Malibu treatment market, its founder Richard Rogg being the first to open a center in Malibu using the six-bed model, which is unique to California.

(for more on the California six-bed model see Treatment Magazine's Special Report: http://www.treatmentmagazine.com/special-reports/193-californias-six-bed-model.html)

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

-ATIN-  05/03/2009  - At ASAM - American Society of Addiction Medicine annual conference - in Dallas a few years back I remember having a very interesting conversation with a senior executive of CRC Health Corporation, the nation's largest addiction treatment provider, as well as the nation's largest disspenser of methadone.

He was talking about meeting General Barry McCaffrey, the former drug warrior who then was on his way to becoming among the most sought after former miltary "talking heads" plying the Washington cable news circuit. Barry Karlin, CRC CEO and founder, who built the company through a series of debt fueled acquisitions, had just hired McCaffrey to join the board, as well as to to work a bit as the face of CRC, accompanying Karlin to public press events where his status as Drug Czar under President Clinton was used as a draw.

Both of us thought it absurd that Karlin hire McCaffrey, considering he did little to advance the cause of treatment and demand management, being a symbol, in fact of the militarization of the War on Drugs that accompanied continued harsh punishment of the nation's addicted. And, apparently, accorrding to the senior CRC exec, McCaffrey didn't appear to care much for addicts themselves.

"In the car together, he [McCaffrey] asked me if I was 'one of them,' to which I repiled no," the exec told me, adding that McCaffrey appeared to be distinctly pleased, nodding his head in approval, it appeared to the exec, that the he was "not one of them." McCaffrey was no doubt asking because as a CRC board member he would know that the vast majority of CRC's employees, like the rest of the 200,000 or so strong addiction treatment industry, are in recovery from addiction.

We were talking about how addicts are subject to widespread and ignorant stigmatization. "Someone with cancer that is not in rfemission is going to be just as unproductive an employee and will have to take work off to be treated," he said. "But when he comes back with the cancer in remission, he's welcomed back as a member in good standing. Someone who goes to addiction treatment and comes back with their disease in remission is looked upon as someone who has committed a transgression, not someone who has a disease in remission."

And in the addiction treatment industry, where tolerance should reign because probably well over 80 percent of employees are in recovery and, presumably there is widespread understanding of addiction as a dis ease, the sentences are even harsher. "For an addiction counselor it is considered standard that they wait two years before they can continue in their profession after a relapse of their addiction," Doug Tieman, CEO of venerable treatment provider Caron, told me, pointing out that he didn't know of any other field that was so hard on its addicted.

Tieman should know how harsh the reaction to addiction can be in the treatment industry. Highly publicised - he made the hugely read, gossipy New York Post Pg 6 column - Tieman's experience came when he was arrested for DUI last year in Palm Beach right after hosting a successful fund raising gala for Caron. As Tieman is credited with engineering a huge turnaround of Caron that has made it the fastest growing and most dynamic of the "prestige non-profits" - Betty Ford, Hazelden, Father Martin's, etc.. -  his job was in little danger. But while the center's board backed him big-time, Tieman said he often had a tough time of it: "You learn who your friends are."

Ted Jackson, Editor and Publisher, TREATMENT MAGAZINE: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

click below read  WHEN CEOs Relapse in TREATMENT MAGAZINE:

http://www.treatmentmagazine.com/special-reports/173-when-ceos-relapse-a-big-business-risk.html

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

info-04/12/09 - ATIN - Authentic Recovery, the successful West Los Angeles center that offers a high-end environment and treatment quality at prices that are considerably below the high-end prices at nearby Malibu treatment centers, is opening an outpatient program in Los Angeles, according to founder and CEO Cassidy Cousins.

Since its opening a little over two years ago, Authentic Recovery has expanded from offering just 12 beds of primary care to offering in-house detox services and a full range of care out the continuum, including extended care and aftercare, as well as highly developed alumni relations.

Cousins founded the center with idea of arbitraging - cannibalizing? - the enormous profit margins to be found at some of the more than 100 California Model treatment centers that line the coast going north from Los Angeles. The Malibu market alone, which consists of some two dozen centers, is a $150 million a year market, Treatment Magazine estimates.

At Authentic Recovery, Cousins offers a very high value added treatment product at a high-end facility, a beautifully furnished and appointed mansion, at prices one-third to half those of many Malibu centers.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Alcoholism Drug Rehab Addiction

- 04/03/09 - ATIN - Mark Houston Recovery Centers, the hugely successful center that, on the private, for-profit side of the treatment business, created the "non-clinical" recovery retreat sector, is offering for the first time a 30-day program, pulling back from the center's previous firm insistsence that all admissions be for at least 90-days.

Charging $15K for the new 30-day offering, Mark Houston center said the program will allow "more flexibility" for those whose "life situations dictate" how long they can stay in treatment.  CEO Mark Houston, who founded the 40 plus bed center on 54 acres in the Texas Hill Country outside of Austin a little over three years ago, was not immediately available for comment on why his center was backing away from its previous very strong insistence on keeping all admissions at least 90-days, a rule that came from Houston's own very fim belief, based on strong empirical evidence, that long treatment stays resulted in much better outcomes.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

03/29/09 - ATIN - In an event that is likely to be viewed from history's perspective as perhaps the key pivitol moment for drug reform in the United States, New York state legislators, pushed by reform-minded Gov. Paterson, are set to reach a deal to repeal the state's draconian 1970s "Rockefeller Laws."

The Rockefeller Laws were passed during the tenure of Gov. Nelson Rockefeller whilst a  wave of crime accompanied the surge of heroin addiction that occurred in the 1970s. The laws, which mandated long sentences for dealing and even for possession, served as a model for later tough anti-drug legislation that swept the states and even was adpoted at the federal level. These laws have served as the basis for the growth of the "prison-industrial complex" confluence of interested groups - police, prison guards DAs, etc.. - and served as the engine of an unprecedented prison building boom that has seen the nation's prison population soar to about 2.2M persons, on a per capita basis a prison population many times larger than that of any other nation.

Until now the progress of drug law reform, and the fight against the "prison industrial complex" of interested groups, has been slow and intermittent. But that has changed lately as state after state has announced major, and sometimes sweeping, proposed changes in their approaches toward drugs, moving away from punitive prison sentences toward mandating treatment, whilst putting far more discretion into the hands ful of judges about which approach to take.

In recent years it has become clear from polling data that the public has been increasingly fed up with the system of harsh mandated prison sentences for even low level possession cases. But politicians, influenced by the disproprotionately politically poweful prison industrial complex, barely moved to reform the system.

It has taken big-time economic pressures, in the form of deep recession induced budget shortfalls, to combine with the public's drug reform readiness, for policy change finally to start to take hold. And there are few places politicians can go to save the kind of money that drug policy refiorm is set to bring, because the policy of punitive drug prohibition was hugely expensive.

Repeal of New York's Rockefeller Laws is set to save Albany a whopping $250M a year. And as reform becomes even more extensive, New York politicians are proceeding cautiously at first, that savings number could rise sharply, according to news reports.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Alcoholism Drug Rehab Addiction

3/21/09  - ATIN -  After regulators banned smoking at addiction treatment centers throughout the state mid year last, treatment providers across New York are complaining bitterly, saying that patient days have plummeted in the wake of what is increasingly looking like an arbitrary and ill considered move on the part of the state addictions industry overseer OASAS.

John Haley, the highly regarded chief operating officer of Westhampton-based Seafield Center, estimates that patient days statewide may have fallen by an astounding one-third in the six months or so since state regulators promulagated the no smoking rule. "This has had a devastating impact on the operations and financials of treatment centers virtually everywhere in the state, including ourselves," says Haley, adding that the highly unpopular move by state regulators has served as a kind on one-two punch for addictions services providers. "The recession hit and now this," Haley says. "It hasn't been easy to say the least."

"We have seen our AMA's ["against medical advice" discharges, meaning clients are leaving treatment early, before completion, in droves] soar since the rule was put into effect," Haley said, adding that he has heard of similar effects at many other centers with which he has been in contact in recent months.

But what may be highly unpopular with clients, and prove to be very bad business for providers, may indeed just be very good clinical practice, according to Dr. Harold Urschel, one of the nation's most respected addictionologists. 'The research shows that smoking acts as a pretty powerful trigger for relapse," Urschel says. "And if you can get people to quit smoking in the early stages of recovery, that long-term recovery is achieved very significantly more than for those that do not quit smoking."

Over the past three years, Urschel, who also is a Stanford MBA and has a strong entrepreneurial bent, has helped raise $5 million from a group of investors who wished the fund the development of a purely scientific "evidence-based' approach to addiction treatment, a model of which Urschel has developed during the time frame. Enterhealth, a Dallas-based treatment startup, has been the result of that effort, with its 12-bed Life Recovery Center opening late last year.

One of the things incorporated into the Enterhealth model, despite what the investors and Urschel suspected might be a strong damp on demand, was that clients must give up smoking before entering treatment. A private pay operation, Life Recovery Center may be hurt more by the no-smoking rule than even investors or Urschel anticipated, if the New York market experience is any guide.

There may be signs that OASIS - considered an enormously intrusive regulator by many a New York provider, most of which complain to some degree or another about the agency - may be reconsidering its treatment center no smoking stance. Instead of making the rule permanent earlier this year after the six months initial comment period, OASAS has instead extended the rule for just another six months, according to Haley.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

- ATIN - 03/09/09 - A giant of the addiction treatment industry, one of a group of charismatic early founders who developed and built the nation's essentially 12-Step-based system of treatment centers, passed this morning.

Father Martin, known by millions who have gone through treatment who saw his ubiquitous "Chalk Talk" video lectures, passed at the age of 84. Father Martin was also one of the principal founders of Father Martin's Ashley, one of the old line private centers - Hazelden, Caron, Betty Ford - that are considered the most prestigious non-profit centers and that still dominate the agenda at organizations such as National Assocaition of Addiction Treatment Providers.

Father Martin's Ashley has recently gone through a major leadership change, as the baton was passed to a well known treatment executive, Father Mark Hushen, from the former CEO Leonard Dahl who built Father Martin's hand-in-hand with Father Martin himself.

"Our phones are ringing off the hook here," Hushen told Addiction Treatment Industry Newswire, ATIN, adding that there has been "a tremendous outporing of love" upon the treatment icon's passing.

Father Mark, as Hushen is known, believes that Father Martin's greatest legacy will be that, though the Chalk Talk videos and thousands of personal apprearances, he made the complex subject of addiction understandable.

And, having been among the earliest pioneer addiction activists, Hushen pointed out that, using humor and enormous eloquency, Father Martin was among those who took the subject of addiction out of the dark and into the light, helping lift taboos on the discussion of addiction in the public forum.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

-ATIN- 02.20.09  Almost forty percent of Betty Ford Center's clients are now accessing long-term care at the prestigious, Palm Springs-based center, which has slightly more than 180 beds, according to John Schwarzlose, Betty Ford's long-time CEO.

Schwarzlose told ATIN that these clients are electing for 90 day stays, and it's not hard to see why. Like an increasing number of centers, newly launched Spirit Lodge in Texas is one, Betty Ford has made its longer term stay price points quite attractive. In fact, Betty Ford's discounting at the 90-day point is very substantial, far more than at centers like Spirit Lodge.

According to Schwarzlose, 90-day care at Betty Ford costs just $42K, or a very affordable $13.5K or so per month, a discount off list in excess of 40 percent.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

-ATIN-02.18.09- After years of examination and study, Hazelden is likely to announce plans for a new center in Florida later this year, according to Mark Mishek, the venerable non-profit's new CEO, who took over the reins late last year.

"I have taken a couple of trips to Florida," Mishek said, adding that "a number of active discussions" are underway right now.  He did not specify whether those discussions involved the acquisition of an existing treatment operation or the acquisition of property for a greenfield development.

After Hazelden's rancorous divorce from what is now the Hanley Center in 2003 - Palm Beach-based Hanley was formerly linked to Hazelden through an agreement, essentially a management contract, by which Hazelden was paid to provide management services - the Minnesota-based treatment giant was given a settlement of milions of  dollars.

The proviso was, of course, that these monies be spent in Florida by Hazelden, which has taken its time deciding its course. A Florida market presence could be a critical help in boosting private pay revenue for Hazelden, with the center able to use its Midwest marketing clout to attract well-heeled clientele looking for a "destination" treatment experience in warmer climes.

Post managed care, Hazelden has had relative difficulty establishing a strong presence in the national private pay market, with the center falling back to a more regional presence and heavy reliance on big - though, admittedly well reimbursed - managed care contracts.   

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

ATIN - 2.13.09 -  In the wake of the difficult and sometimes damaging tenure of former CEO Ellen Breyer, Hazelden's new CEO tells Treatment Magazine that his first and foremost prioity as he takes over the reins of the venerable non-profit will be to"rebuild and repair" badly frayed feelings and relationships, both within the organization and also throughout the addiction treatment industry.

More often than not aloof, and occasionally abrasive, Breyer's management style cut a swath of resentment and anger within the ranks of Hazelden's employees - almost the entire top management team, Breyer's direct reports, quit in late 2006 and throughout 2007, including such high profile Hazelden players as then External Affairs VP William Moyers - but also outside the organization, where Breyer was seen by some as exemplary of how Hazelden had become "arrogant with little to be arrogant about anymore."

Taking over from Breyer is another treatment industry outsider - some thought it imperative a Hazelden veteran succeed Breyer - but  one with extensive medical industry experience as the former CEO of a multi-billion dollar Minnesota health system. Mark Mishek spoke to Treatment Magazine in early February, the interview for a feature article - His Work Cut for Him: Mishek Faces Array of Hazelden Challehges Post Breyer - to be published in the magazine's February 2009 issue.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction, Drug Rehab, Alcoholism

02/06/09 - ATIN - Youth treatment leader Gatehouse Academy has brought Ed Lacy in as CEO, a move that comes at a time when the thriving Wickenburg,AZ-based private center is engaged in a major expansion of capacity and program offerings that has catapulted the center virtually overnight into the ranks of the largest treatment enterprises in the nation.

Clearly, Lacy is excited about the new opportunity and strongly impressed by what he has seen so far at Gatehouse. "There's no question this place rocks," says Lacy, who seemed surprised that he had not previously heard of the center before becoming acquainted recently with founder Ted Earl, who is amongst the earliest pioneers in what is now a multi-billion dollar, nationwide private therapeutic schools marketplace.  The passing of the baton from Earl, a charismatic industry founder and pioneer, to Lacy, a highly experienced industry clinician administrator who has worked in myriad capacities at private centers in markets like Malibu and Arizona, with additional key, and highly prestigious, experience running the Navy's training school for addictions counselors, is a key industry story that is increasingly being played out at addictions centers across the nation in recent years. Treatment Magazine examined this generational baton-passing issue - from charismatic founders to technocratic managers and consolidators - in its December 2007 Special Report: The New Guard.

According to Gatehouse, in its press release accompanying the announcement of Lacy as CEO, the former Marine will be charged with seeing the youth center, which specializes in the high growth, but underserved, college aged addict marketplace, through its next expansion phase. "It's been almost nine years since the conception that is now Gatehouse Academy," says Managing Partner  Kent Sherman, adding that Lacy will focus on such key institutional issues such as the creation of the quality control protocols, and other proceedures and policies, that underpin and make growth sustainable.

And, indeed, the next growth phase is already upon Gatehouse. According to Lacy, bed cpacity skyrocketed last year - from90 beds to 175 beds - amidst an expansion that has brought major new program offerings into the Gatehouse fold, vastly increasing the therapeutic reach of the center and, thus, presumably, its therapeutic effectiveness. One guy who is sold -- Lacy himself. He says he was quite literally moved as he witnessed youth transformation occur during a visit to the center's new wilderness program, which is located in the Canadian northland near Thunder Bay, Ontario.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

02/03/09 -ATIN - Operators of sober living facilities in the Los Angeles area, members most of a 300 or so strong local sober living coalition, report that relapse rates at their centers skyroketed over the holiday season as the national mood darkend amidst economic stormclouds the likes of which current generations have never even come close to seeing.

"Our census tumbled over 20 percent during the holidays, as one client after another succommed," says Andrew Martin, CEO of Serene Center Long Beach, a recently opened facility that seeks to provide a highly structured therapeutic transitional environment, working with primary care centers on a cross referral basis to help realize more fully on a chronic disease model of care. "Others [sober living facilities] in our coalition have been making similar grumblings at recents meetings," he continued.

In an unrelated development, Martin said that the founder of the LA County  Sober Living Coalition, Ken Schonlau, has passed. "He was a pioneer in this business," Martin said.

Newswire Staff

Addiction Drug Rehab alcoholism

-ATIN- 10/03/08 - The older adult market of the addiction treatment industry, followed by the young adult market, is the fastest growing market of the business, according to the full version of the 2006 TEDS report, the most up-to-date release of the critical addiction industry information source produced by SAMHSA.

The report shows that, since 1996, the older adult market, 45 years and up, has soared to 22 percent of all admissions from 13 percent, and young adult admissions, 18 years to 24 years, have risen from approximately 14 percent of admissions to 19 percent of admissions, SAMHSA said.

Overall, according to TEDS, industry admissions declined to $1.8M in 2006 from $1.861M admissions in 2005, confirming beyond dobt a trend of downward admissions begun in 2003 after admissions peaked at $1.9M in 2002, a 5 percent decline overall in three years from 2003 to 2006. Between 1996 and 2002, admissions climbed 15.6 percent, or an average of 2.2 percent annually.

The decline in TEDS report admissions is worrisome, especially for the public side of the treatment industry, which are the overwhelming majority of reporting institutions for the TEDS data. And as states grapple with massive budget shortfalls, and local governments increasingly experience revenue problems and lack of access to credit, it is likely that admissions data from TEDS may decline even further and potentially much more sharply.

TEDS admissions trends are much less relevent for the $5 billion or so private side of the addiction treatment industry, for which the outlook is much brighter. Insurance payors, which Treatment Magazine estimates currently provide about half of all revenues for the private sid e of the business, with private pay accounting for the other half, have already cut their in addiction spending to the bone and are unlikely to be able to get away with cutting much more without a major public outcry. And private pay is hurting - witness the 10 percent decline in same facility revenue at CRC's Youth Division, formerly Aspen Education - but is unlikely to fall of a cliff and may even grow a bit as people who need treatment need it no matter what their economic fears.

And private players who concentrate on fast growing sectors may experience strong growth. If struggling South Florida-based Hanley Center, whose low census earlier this year and last indicate big financial losses, can take advantage of its unquestioned position as the leader in older adult care, by far the fastest growing addiction market,  the addiction treatment provider may be able to revive itself and even grow. And smart, highly successful operators, like The Watershed, also in South Florida, are concentrating on young adults, this year launching a specialty primary program aimed at the market, while vastly expanding extended care capabilities that are critical for good outcomes with youth clients.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

-ATIN- 09/14/08 - Facing what he says is a $2 billion shortfall in the state's budget, Gov. Rod Blagojevich has cut $55 million from the state's alcohol and drug treatment budget - over 20 percent - and sparked a political battle royale in the state that is among the most contentious of the many fights that are erupting across the country as state treatment budgets are slashed in the midst of a $40 billion shortfall in state balance sheets nationwide.

Treatment Magazine estimates that, overall, about $25 billion a year is spent on addiction treatment nationwide, with about $19 billion of that coming from either local, state or federal funding. Over the last 10 years or so, the states have been the fastest growing source of funding for the addiction treatment industry, now accounting for about 60 percent of all public funding for for addiction treatment.

And while it is likely that the public treatment money in Illinois will be resotred, the state's lower house in the legislature on Wednesday voted 113-0 to restore the funding and treatment advocates are hopping mad that state Senate President Emil Jones is in no hurry to get the state's upper house to vote on funding restoration, another $55 million in matching federal funding for addiction in Illinois is now also in jeopardy.

The effects of the cutbacks are already beginning to be felt across the state. In August, publicly funded treatment leader Haymarket House in Chicago was forced to turn away hundreds of people seeking help due to $4 million in lost state money, according to the Chicago Tribune. And advocates at TASC say that, overall, the loss of funding in what was previously a nearly $250 million state budget for treatment will effect over 42,000 people statewide seeking help.

Illinois is far from alone among states that are cutting treatment budgets.The Florida state budget has been hit hard by the real estate downturn as themania that previously sent the state's real estate markets soaring has unwound sharply, and big real estate hit states like California are also in battles concerning state funding for addiction treatment.. among many others.

So far, proposals in Florida that would have cut $36 million from the Florida budget for public treatment - a move that would have closed a majority of the state's publicly funded centers - have not gone through, but the situation in the state remains extremely fluid as the state faces a massive $9 billion state shortfall. Nevertheless, big centers like Operation PAR in the St. Petersburg area and Coastal Behavioral Healthcare in Sarasota are facing significant cutbacks, with executives at PAR estmating earlier this year that funding would likely fall by about 10 percent for the year.

(Note To Readers: Please let us know what is going on in your state with regard to state and local funding so we can report your local events in this important national industry story. Our email address is below) 

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

-ATIN- 09/13/08 - As Hurricanne Ike barrelled toward the Texas coast Friday, The Right Step CEO George Joseph made the decision to move all the affordable care provider's patients in the city of Houston to Right Step facilities in the Dallas area, according Right Step Chief Marketing Officer Paul Auchterlonie.

The Right Step, Texas' largest private addiction treatment company, is based in Houston and has extensive primary care and sober living operations in the area. ATIN attempted to contact Founder and CEO George Joseph over the weekend, but all circuits into the Houston area appeared to be busy as calls from around the nation flooded into the stricken region.

It is likely that other providers in the region, such as Memorial Hermann's Prevention and Recovery Center, PaRC, which has such undergone a huge and costly expansion and upgrading of its facilities recently, have also taken steps to ensure the safety of their clientele. ATIN was also unable to reach Matt Feehery, PaRC's CEO.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism

-ATIN- 09/09/08- Voted by his peers as the leading pain specialist in the San Diego area, Dr. Joe Shurman will chair the newly revamped pain program at Casa Palmera, a 90-bed high-end private pay facility located in the tony enclave of Rancho Santa Fe in Southern California.

"We're creating the premier pain program in the nation here at Casa Palmera," Shurman told ATIN, adding that the program will be the leading alternative for people who wish to manage their pain while minimizing the use addictive drugs to alleviate their suffering.

Shurman, who played basketball for Temple University and is working on a book that tells the stories of how sports and other personalities have dealt with pain, is among the founders of the key "Share The Risk" program for doctors. Share The Risk, which was founded to respond to the enormous risk doctors take on when they prescribe opiates, gives physicians critical advice and referrals for treating pain. About 17 percent of pain docs are investigated every year, and every day a doc somewhere in the nation is arrested, according to Shurman.

"The hot issue became Oxycontin and the enormous abuse that flowed from that," he said. "At Casa Palmera we'll be a beacon and an example of how to safely and highly effectively treat a wide range of pain problems."

Southern California medical industry entrepreneur Lee Johnson and his family founded Casa Palmera in one of the most substantial high-end addiction treatment buildouts in recent memory. This summer, Johnson brought in former Betty Ford exec Cherlyne Short Majors and former Bay Recovery CEO Phyllis Meagher to turbocharge management of the high-end facility.

Shurman also chairs pain at nearby Scripps Health, a San Diego health system that includes four acute care hospitals and extensive outpatient capability, with 2,600 associated physicians.

Newswire Staff

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Addiction Drug Rehab Alcoholism