The Effectiveness of the Florida Department of Corrections Residential Substance Abuse Treatment - Research Paper Example

The Analysis of the Effectiveness of the Florida Dept. of Corrections Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) of the Prison Programs Introduction The huge prison population in the United States, which comprises 1.9 million American adults in federal, state and local facilities, is effectively treated for residential substance abuse by running various initiatives. According to CASA (1998)), one in every 144 American adults is put behind bars for a crime involving drug use. Such figures, as stated above, can be improvised if prisoners tagged with substance abuse problems can be successfully treated. There is sufficient reasoning to offer the treatment in correctional surroundings. The provision of treatment services in jails seems to be a viable method and has certain benefits comparatively to outpatient and enforced treatment. These benefits include: 1) surety of getting registered in the program and active participation by those prisoners who would not possibly opt for the treatment by their own, 2) program design particular to residential surroundings as treatment choices, and 3) the parole procedure guarantees involvement in after-release care services. The incarceration-based treatment of stubborn drug users who are high-risk recidivists looks to be both an arguable and effective way to control the general crime rate (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). RSAT in Florida RSAT started in Florida in 1999 with a funding of $19,917,500 to prisoners who have been diagnosed with dual disorders. A total of 714 inmates have finished treatment successfully in the state correctional institutes. The University of South Florida has been leading in providing services in RSAT program enforcement for co-occurring troubles in correctional surroundings. It has developed the syllabi and offered concurrent guidance, location visits, and technical help (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). The residential community corrections program, aimed at peace-loving inmates, has successfully treated 156 adult males. In total, 304 juveniles have successfully finished one of Florida’s RSAT programs. In Florida, RSAT programs started functioning in six of the eleven county correctional facilities in 2003. Prisoners taking part in the program included adult male and female prisoners and juvenile males as well. The number of prisoners successfully finishing their treatment was 772 (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). LITERATURE REVIEW Definition of program effectiveness may depend on different steps taken, including relapse, behavioral transformation, skill creation, and particularly recidivism (MacKenzie and Hickman, 1998). The analysis collected information on a number of parameters to find the effectiveness of the RSAT program. MacKenzie and Hickman (1998, p. 5) have rightly advocated the scope of recidivism employing various measures to get “a more complete picture of program effectiveness (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Barriers to Outcome Research The leading aim of research is to assess the effectiveness of the Florida Dept. of Corrections Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) program. Effectiveness is defined by the depth to which a policy or program is attaining its aims. While enforcement, procedure, and outcome attempts are critical to analyze in finding program effectiveness, it is generally complicated to differentiate program effects from other leading factors affecting the performance of such programs. At the same time, it is not easy to differentiate program effects from change range, which, like “noise,” may hide the effect of a program (Berk and Rossi, 1990, p. 54)). It is significant to show a straight connection between the intervention and variations in the dependent variable. For residential substance abuse programs such as the Florida Dept. of Corrections, one can locate variations in later use of the substance and cancellations between those prisoners participating in the RSAT and those getting matching but unique program while in the prison. The literature on appraisals of drug programs for prisoners offers analyses on the importance of suitable research designs (Gregrich, 1992), enforcement issues (Inciardi, Martin, Lockwood, Hooper, and Wald, 1992)), and comprehensiveness of treatment interventions (Wexler et al., 1999)) (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). In spite of scholarship attraction and touchiness to these issues, the kind and origin of a number of research issues is far from the scope of measuring research design and therefore, away from the functioning of the measuring team. In that measurement, research is a social and political procedure with some randomly-happening hurdles, particular to correctional programs, can emerge when paired with extra existent or sudden roadblocks more nearly connected to treatment program measurement (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Impending Risks to Research Design A number of issues can emerge to the research design of Florida RSAT program, such as prejudiced selection or enforced selection of prisoners. Later issues could include death and maturation over the time of the research. A research design needs to be developed and implemented in full view of the possible hurdles to the experiment. Avoiding the random selection of prisoners should be the right path and should be selected by adhering to strict quality parameters by fulfilling the six conditions. Comparison groups need to be equivalent. The sample size should be manageable. Possibility of compromising with data quality remains if sample size is too large (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Maturation means a transformation within subjects; it is based on the fact that across the period of the experiment, these subjects are continuously maturing and getting old (Maxfield and Babbie, 2001)). This possibility exists in the case of the RSAT program that prisoners’ success and progress may actually be uninterrupted in self-realization, repentance or a routine downfall in substance abuse. Prisoners’ results may be because of routine-happening changes in stead of the effectiveness of the RSAT program (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Besides, historical happenings may take place during the evaluation that can complicate the experimental results (Maxfield and Babbie, 2001)). These kinds of happenings are not included in the scope of the research, therefore, can not be effectively analyzed to find the degree of impact on the outcomes (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Coercion, more particularly, enforced on prisoners, can also contribute to the comparative success of the effectiveness of the RSAT program. Coercion is not always wrong, as it could help the chronic drug users, as they could be more inclined to detest drug treatment on their own, while mandated substance abuse treatment may not be the best source for rehabilitation of prisoners. Impact of coercion could be different on inmates. It may create the feeling of hatred and resentment in some inmates, therefore, helping in the creation of a strained and full of animosity between the prison, prison management, and treatment team. Recuperation from a substance use mostly depends upon an inmate’s dedicated effort to refrain from the consumption of the substance. Forced treatment is therefore, against the notion, and it could nullify the impact of the treatment. This may impact the effectiveness of RSAT and matching programs to the limit that prisoners not interested or ready to accept the treatment are less possibility to succeed and finish the RSAT program and are more possible to opt out or relapse (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Effectiveness of RSAT program of a state can be checked via comparison between participating and not-participating inmates. The national Institute of justice has been forerunner in organizing programs of this nature. Program comprises either one or a combination of three treatment methods: therapeutic residential, cognitive behavioral methods, and 12-step programs (e.g., Alcoholics Anonymous, Cocaine Anonymous). Combination treatments, nevertheless, have not been comprehensively checked; the inspection found that such programs may offer less efficient treatment if the accessories are washed away (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). A hurdle that RSAT programs face is the recruitment and retaining of treatment teams. Correctional organizations are not permitted to employ persons with substance abuse or criminal histories, but many therapeutic services providers engage recuperating program graduates in guiding and employee roles in outside locations (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). Other hurdles include low salaries to the staff and traveling expenses to far-away and forlorn prison locations. A meta-analysis of effectiveness checking at 12 RSAT locations found positive results from in-prison substance abuse treatment. One critical element is that inmates stand less chance to be rearrested or put on an increased custody level. Aftercare treatment also was linked to reduced degree of recidivism (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). RSAT programs help in boosting self-respect, decision-taking, and self-power, and minimize their degrees of eagerness, depression, misadventure, and hatred. Cognitive distortions, such as becoming self-centric, finding faults with others, minimizing, and imagining the worst can also be critically brought down with reduced degrees of recidivism. RSAT programs add to the self-respect of inmates’ decision-making, and capacity building and minimize their degrees of eagerness depression, risk taking abilities, and hostility (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). In the case of women offenders, they comprise much reduced number of substance users. Both therapeutic communities and cognitive behavior-focused therapy have developed community-based treatment and reverence to after-release substance-users. RSAT effectiveness has been proved, as treated women inmates are less possible to be imprisoned relatively to comparison groups. A woman’s possibility of being rearrested critically reduces with the added treatment she gets. Additionally, research has found that variations between RSAT participants regarding hiring, parenting, and appraisal of women’s programs also indicate towards particular huge differences. Imprisoned women with children have difficulty finding suitable work. In certain states, women guilty of substance crimes are not accepted to be fit for training via welfare-to-work programs, although such women are in dire need of job and vocational and academic services (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). Dually diagnosed offenders An RSAT approximation of dually diagnosed prisoners indicates the significance of a well-structured reentry method for inmates. Inmates participating in the research underwent lapses and changes in prescribed medicines. This caused physical or mental side-effects and lack of stability sometimes leading to relapse. Reentry can create hope that dually diagnosed inmates follow their medication routine to bring stability in their mental health, which was a central aspect in minimizing relapse and assisting inmates to remain absent from substances within 3 months of being relieved from prison (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). Better coordination between institutional staff and psychiatrists in the locality can be helpful to dually diagnosed offenders’ easy reentry procedure. Specifically, institutions should attend to the critical time needs soon after release by making sure that inmates have enough medicines until their first visit to a community mental health facilitator, shifting provision to a living place, an identification card, and other benefit cards (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). Strengthening RSAT Programs Several strategies have been planned to strengthen RSAT programs in the future, which include: Taking a promise from the Department of Corrections and prison administration officials to follow the treatment program objectives and reduce disturbances to the treatment procedure. Develop an evidence- based RSAT treatment model. It is necessary to guarantee similar treatment for all participants. The staff should be trained in that particular curriculum to ensure that they carry the expertise with that specific treatment model, shortlisted for the program. Attention on providing well-aligned treatment and reentry into the services for offender aftercare community ((U.S. Department of Justice, 2005). The community corrections programs are principally ideal for checking and providing support to substance using prison inmates. According to White House (2012), in 2009 the frequency of illegal use of the substance in the age-group of 12-49 on probation was crossing the double number of the prisoners not on probation. Heavy workload for probation officers and judges, compounded with the reduced preference given to service of warrants for probation breakings, have concurrently complicated the adherence with probation, causing a failure on this front touching the frequency of failure to nearly 40 percent. Treatment in Prison A number of innovative criminal justice programs have been structured for jail inmates facing drug abuse issues, aimed at change in the habit of drug use, drug courts, and other options to imprisonment although imprisonment could be, in certain case, the suitable answer to a prisoner’s criminal behavior. Nevertheless, it is significant that treatment and other services are made available during imprisonment. The federal government is contributing on a big scale through BJA’s Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) program for state prisoners. The RSAT program is structured for states, tribes, and local governments to serve the community through RSAT to prisoners and help the criminals to rewind back to the community they belong with a new zest. The program includes reentry planning functions into treatment programs, and promotes the community-based treatment and other wider in scope aftercare services soon after prisoners get released (White House, 2012). New on the agenda of the federal government is to function with other related agencies for the provision of evidence-based treatment services to the Federal prisoners. The federal government plans to provide the leverage to the state governments by including other services in the federal government offerings of training and technical know-how to state RSAT programs with the purpose of optimizing the use of evidence-based substance abuse treatment and aftercare for those prisoners who require this treatment. New training syllabi, including the prevalent evidence based practices and aftercare study, will be offered through a website. This will further the area of RSAT for present benefiters, and for other ranks like directors, major correctional personnel, and treatment providers enforcing or strategizing to enforce residential treatment (White House, 2012). National data on Recidivism Researches A number of singular initiatives have been taken on specific criminal justice programs to find out the frequency of recidivism, but considering the involvement of state and local criminal justice systems, it is complicated to exactly measure recidivism frequency on a federal scale. Before creating dependable ways of minimizing recidivism among drug users, it needs to be first found out what is the number of released offenders reentering the system. Data on the number of such offenders need to be of high quality, reaching from the state and Federal corrections institutions. Presently, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) provides finance to the Criminal History Record Information Sharing Project, for facilitating BJS with a safer system to automate and process the gathering of criminal history observations from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and state criminal history records. Last year, good progress has been made on this front to further the gathered data. It is under the planning to centralize the criminal record information on prisoners released in 2005 from nearly 30 states into a comprehensive database to help in the analysis of recidivism at the federal level. Outcomes of this research will be made available in 2012. This new data gathering procedure will facilitate a better and all-inclusive analysis of recidivism and further the cause of a national recidivism research (White House, 2012). METHODOLOGY Research Purpose The leading aim of this proposal is to discuss the effectiveness of the Florida Dept. of Corrections Residential Substance Abuse Treatment (RSAT) of the State Prison Programs. Research Design The research design is intended to measure the effectiveness of RSAT by employing a semi experimental design. A semi-experimental design will be used as actual random assignment is not possible over the course of the duration of the RSAT program and further-up time. During some procedural waves, the number of treatment beds could not be sufficient for selected prisoners. As an outcome, all selected prisoners need to be enrolled to the treatment group. The prisoners shortlisted for the treatment group will be compared against a comparison group on program-related parameter measures (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Prisoners in each of the groups need to meet particular kind of parameters associated to their imprisonment under the Florida State Offenders Act. For instance, all criminals imprisoned under this law need to be in the same age limit (17 to 25 years), have matching criminal records, and have attained some kind of intensive programming. Besides, all selected criminals are supposed to fulfill certain fitness and mental health levels as framed by the Florida Dept. of Corrections program protocol (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Program effectiveness will thereon be decided by comparing the treatment group with a comparison group on critical standards, including later criminal behavior and drug recidivism over a 12-month review period (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Prisoner Selection to Treatment and Comparison Groups Selections of prisoners for the study will be made from those males imprisoned to the Florida Department of Correction (FDC) under the Youthful Offenders Act (YOA), and are sentenced to take part in a Youthful Offender Intensification Program (YOIP). YOIP comprises of three parts, including an organizational part (Phase 111), where program stresses either on intensive education services or on intensive substance abuse treatment services (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). The study includes a semi-experimental design with a sample taken of two groups: 1) a treatment group and 2) a comparison group. Criminals in the treatment group make up those male youth offenders who finish the Phases I and I1 of the (YOIP) successfully, and during inhaling and approximation are found to be chemically polluted, as based on the Substance Abuse Subtle Screening Inventory (S.A.S. S.I.) ranking and/or through clinical test. For young criminals who are diagnosed as chemically polluted and who clear the Phase 11, the arrangement of beds in the Addictions Treatment Unit will decide whether or not they are admitted to the program, or another intensive program. Engaging prisoners with the treatment program happens in one of two means: 1) by random offering if the provision of beds is less than the number of qualified program participants, or 2) automatically if there is sufficient number of beds for qualified program participants. Those who qualify treatment will also need to fulfill other program parameters, designed from criminal record, conduct during past sentences, and medical/mental health criteria. Those prisoners offered entry to the treatment group in Phase I11 may participate in the Correctional Recovery Academy program arranged at the Addictions Treatment Unit at the Correctional Institution. Offenders in the comparison group will be compared with the participants in the treatment group on the parameters and qualifications stated above (e.g., male young prisoner, S.A. S. S.I. ranking and/or medical check-up, criminal record, medical and mental health constraints). Nevertheless, because of random selection and the provision of beds in the Addictions Treatment Unit, they rather can be given to alternative intensive program until they finish from Phase 111 (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Valuation of Program Outcomes The leading purpose of this research is to analyze the effectiveness of RSAT treatment on young prisoners, and more particularly, if program participation creates a positive impact on future conduct like relapse and repeat use of drug. RSAT participation will form the outcome or independent variable. In other words, it will decide whether RSAT participants and graduates are less possible to relapse relatively to those who take part and mature from other intensive program (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). Personal confrontations among criminals can also downgrade program results, or converse with program participation to disable desired results. This analysis gathered information on variables perceived to interfere in the connection between RSAT participation and the framed parameters. Data will also be gathered on demographic research tools linked to family traits, such as age, race/ethnic, histories, and residence choice (Miller & Koons-Witt, 2003). CONCLUSION Any check on the effectiveness of RSAT program requires a workable program having meaning for further research. Without an efficient data gathering program, relationships of internal staff with external analysts and means of research, it is not possible to get leverage from the gathered data. Independent research can play a significant part in presenting unbiased feedback on critical problem areas for future changes. Analyses of RSAT at local level have been encouraging. Future RSAT program analyses need enough sample size, suitable comparison groups, and enough time to organize a potential analysis to check whether after getting released from the prison, level of success does not deteriorate. Longitudinal procedural checks need to be organized for 3 years and outcome checks should continue to be performed till 5 years of the release (National Institute of Justice, 2003). References Miller, J.M., & Koons-Witt, B. (2003). Outcome evaluation of the South Carolina residential substance abuse treatment program for state prisoners. Retrieved from http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/grants/199407.pdf MacKenzie, D.L. & Hickman, L. J. (1 998). What works in corrections? An examination of the effectiveness of the type of rehabilitation programs offered by Washington State Department of Corrections". Report to the State qf Washington Legislature Joint Audit and Review Committee. National Institute of Justice. (2003). Residential Substance Abuse Treatment for State Prisoners: Implementation Lessons Learned. Retrieved from http://www.thinkers.sa.gov.au/lib/pdf/Hora/Hora_NationalInstituteofJusticeReport.pdf U.S. Department of Justice. (2005). Residential Substance Abuse Treatment for State Prisoners (RSAT) Program. Retrieved from http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/bja/206269.pdf White House. (2011). Break the Cycle of Drug Use, Crime, Delinquency, and Incarceration. Office of National Drug Control Policy. Retrieved from http://www.whitehouse.gov/ondcp/break-the-cycle-of-drug-use-crime-delinquency-and-incarceration Read More