Desired outcomes of drug-treatment: Normative and individual meanings and the impact of treatment processes

Description

Health care service providers are offering solutions to recognised problems. By setting treatment goals and processes they contribute to normative understandings of “good health” (Anderson 2012). Institutions impose their symbolic power to achieve the ends they desire (Bourdieu 1989). Sercu & Bracke (2016) argue that treatment interactions in mental health care are not only influenced by the social positions but the systems of meaning people impose. People holding views on illness and appropriate treatment deviating from those of the treatment agency may not profit from treatments in the same way. In the context of a five-year-evaluation of an abstinence-oriented drug treatment facility in Austria available quantitative data from the patients at the beginning (n=129), at the end (n=56) and one year after the therapy was analysed (n=41). To gain a better insight on treatment processes, additionally, qualitative interviews (n=20) were conducted with patients (current and former – successful and not successful), professionals associated with the treatment facility and professionals associated with clients after or during treatment. These data allows an approximation to the following questions from different viewpoints: - How is desired outcome defined by different actors? To which extent are these definitions in accordance with the “official goals”? - Which processes are regarded as essential for reaching the desired outcome? - How are these processes and the outcome affected by different perceptions?

Period	23 Aug 2017
Event title	Contemporary Drug Problems
Event type	Conference
Location	FinlandShow on map