This project will employ a randomized design to evaluate the efficacy of Hatha Yoga as an alternative to traditional psychotherapy in an outpatient methadone maintenance treatment setting. The stated goals are to reduce alcohol and drug use, reduce criminal activity and to increase clients retention to treatment. Two cohorts of new methadone clients (60 males and females, age 18 and older) will be randomly assigned to one of two treatment groups: conventional methadone treatment(CMT) with individual psychotherapy and weekly psychodynamic group therapy versus the alternative methadone treatment (AMT) group which differs only in that the yoga group will substitute for the weekly psychodynamic group. All subjects will be evaluated initially, and at 5 months and 10 months into treatment. Dependent measures include the results of the urinalysis and breathalyzer tests, the Addiction Severity Index Profile and recidivism rates on daily methadone, weekly individual therapy and group or Yoga meetings.They will use multivariate and univariate analyses to assess the differences in treatment outcome. The secondary objective is to produce a yoga teaching manual targeted to substance addicted populations.
