Abstract
Despite the importance of counseling in methadone maintenance treatment, many patients do not take advantage of these services. Incentives for attending group counseling were offered to methadone-maintained patients during an orientation phase of treatment or during required attendance at a relapse group later in treatment. Upon attending each counseling session, patients could draw for prizes under an escalating draw system with a 50% probability that draws would result in a prize. Incentives included small ($1), moderate ($5), and large ($20) prizes, with chances of winning inversely related to prize costs, and a maximum possible total of $160 per patient. It was anticipated that this policy would provide a relatively low-cost approach to improving counseling attendance in our methadone clinic. The incentive policy significantly increased the percent of counseling sessions attended (52% vs. 76%) and promoted periods of continuous attendance. These data further support the effectiveness of low-cost incentive programs in enhancing counseling attendance among methadone patients.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 253-258 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Journal | Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment |
Volume | 29 |
Issue number | 4 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Dec 2005 |
Keywords
- Attendance
- Contingency management
- Counseling
- Intermittent reinforcement
- Methadone maintenance
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Phychiatric Mental Health
- Medicine (miscellaneous)
- Clinical Psychology
- Psychiatry and Mental health