Employment is an important element in the rehabilitation of heroin addicts. The major purpose of this research is to combine two effective interventions in order to develop a powerful and cost-effective vocational rehabilitation program for methadone clients. The program includes training in interpersonal/personal skills needed to overcome barriers to employment.utilizing Platt and Metzger's Vocational Problem-Solving (VPS) intervention, and teaching job-seeking and interview skills using Hall, Loeb and LeVois' Job Seekers' Workshop (JSW). The study is based on the hypothesis that a combined intervention addressing work-related cognitions and job-seeking strategies will be more powerful in increasing employment among methadone clients than either intervention alone. The relationship between these interventions and employment rate/stability, relapse to drug use, hopelessness and depression indices, as well as work-related attitudes/problems will be evaluated. An important aspect of the research is determination of each intervention's cost of service delivery in terms of successful outcome, thus providing valuable information about the cost- efficiency of implementing the program on a large scale. An additional focus of this research is identifying those demographic, cognitive, and behavioral characteristics associated with outcome; specifically, racial and gender differences, psychological and social factors, and employment- related attitudes and problems. Such information will contribute to developing a theoretical model of employment rehabilitation. Approximately 500 unemployed methadone maintenance clients will be recruited from new admissions to the participating methadone facility over a 28 month period. Subjects will be randomly assigned to 3 groups: VPS alone, JSW alone, or VPS+JSW. Employment status will be monitored bi-weekly and verified through pay stubs. Drug use will be monitored weekly through random urine testing, symptomatology and employment-related problems will be assessed at baseline, 6- and 12-month follow-ups.
| Lidz, Victor; Sorrentino, Diane M; Robison, Lenore et al. (2004) Learning from disappointing outcomes: an evaluation of prevocational interventions for methadone maintenance patients. Subst Use Misuse 39:2287-308 |
| Widman, M; Lidz, V; DiGregorio, G J et al. (2000) Health status of employed and unemployed methadone patients. J Subst Abuse Treat 18:287-9 |
