Intensive Outpatient Program for Substance Abuse
Located in Richmond, Virginia
Real Recovery for Real Life
An Intense Program For Intense Results
IOPs are used as a step-up from regular mental health therapy through a more intense treatment plan. An Intensive Outpatient Program is by its nature, more intense. While anyone struggling with substance use can enroll, this type of programs is especially recommended for people in which therapy for substance abuse has previously proven ineffective, and for those at higher risk of hospitilization.
Maintain Independence And Freedom
While the program requires a more intense and higher level of treatment, patients also maintain a higher level of independence and freedom through the outpatient model in which the patient is not required to live in our facility. This balance of high quality of care and personal life makes the Intensive Outpatient Program more attractive to people struggling with substance abuse.
When you’re in the throes of addiction, life can be unmanageable
The biology of addiction causes people to lose control over their actions. Someone in the throes of addiction will crave and seek out drugs, alcohol, or other substances no matter what the cost—even at the risk of damaging friendships, hurting family, or losing jobs. This is all sounds straightforward and obvious, but addiction is a disease that’s as complex as it is simple.
Work with specialized, licensed experts who have real experience and track records of successfully helping people reach recovery and thrive. Reach a life better than you can even currently imagine. Start the road to recovery today.
When substances start to interfere with your life
Craving & Seeking Drug of Choice
Uncontrollable thoughts about the drug
Unwaivering focus on the drug of choice
Sacrificing quality of life in favor of drugs
Relationships in turmoil because of drugs
About The IOP Treatment Schedule
Treatment is personalized in accordance to each individual’s needs to achieve their goals. Typically, a patient will likely be in both group and individual therapy for two to three hours a day, three to five days a week. While the program involves a more intense therapy schedule, this also results in a more concentrated duration of the program which typically lasts about four to six weeks.
In addition to psychotherapy, if a patient is on any prescribed psychiatric medications, they will likely be meeting with a psychiatrist for medication management and assessment.
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Substance abuse is often present alongside other mental health conditions which may feed into the abuse of substances or be the cause of it. Thus, our IOP program is tailored to treat a multitude of dual diagnoses.
Our IOP Program Can Also Treat:
- Depression
- Eating Disorders
- Suicidal Ideation
More About IOP Treatment Modalities
Depending on what brings an individual into IOP, the type of treatment may vary, but what follows are some of the most common experiences.
- 12-Step Facilitation
- Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
- Motivational Approaches
- Therapeutic Community
- The Matrix Model
- Community Reinforcement and Contingency Management Approaches
Other Modalities
- Some IOPs may help a patient connect with adjunct or alternative therapies, such as Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, ketamine infusions, EMDR, or yoga therapy.
12- Step Facilitation
Though the 12-step model was originally developed for Alcoholics Anonymous, the approach is also used for people with drug misuse, eating disorders, and other compulsive disorders. When the 12-step model is used in an IOP or similar setting, people will begin working through the steps under therapeutic supervision.
A major advantage to these types of programs is the ease of ongoing support for individuals through their ability to attend AA meetings in the community afterward, continuing their work from the IOP.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) is based on the idea of giving people skills to deal with when confronted with triggers, as well as helping reframe cognitive distortions that lead to those behaviors that are maladaptive. CBT is a particularly good match for intensive outpatient programs because people are still in their normal situations and so can test out the new skills right away.
Motivational Approaches
Approaches such as Motivational Interviewing or Motivational Enhancement Therapy are designed to discover someone’s ambivalence towards treatment and changing their behaviors.
The therapy is kind—acknowledging that substances or behaviors had served some purpose for the client—but also directive by strong encouragement to confront one’s behaviors that are not aligned with their desired outcomes or values.
Therapeutic Community
The idea of a therapeutic community is derived from residential substance use treatment. However, some programs also use them for IOPs, especially as a step down from residential. Their approach is “community as method,” using any social interaction as a way to guide change and help people find better skills once they are back in their original community.
Matrix Model
The Matrix Model was founded in the 1980s to address the widespread cocaine and stimulant problems at the time. It integrates several different approaches, including CBT, 12-step and motivational enhancement to target change. The full program is 16 weeks and combines individual sessions with psychoeducational sessions, relapse prevention sessions and family and social support groups.
Community Reinforcement and Contingency Management Approaches
Those methodologies are based on the idea that future behavior is influenced by positive or negative consequences from past behaviors. The approaches, in an IOP setting, use a points/reward system to reinforce the desired behaviors. This could look like someone being able to “buy” (have a staff member buy them) a small reward once they have saved enough points.
More About Intensive Outpatient Programs
IOPs are considered a higher level of care that exists on a spectrum.
That spectrum of IOPs includes:
- Outpatient therapy: This is the type of therapy most people are familiar with or attend. It is generally held in a therapist’s office, and most people go once a week.
- Partial Hospitalization (PHP): A partial hospitalization program, often confused with an IOP, is typically about five hours of therapy a day (including both group therapies and individual therapy), for five days a week.
- Inpatient Acute Care: When someone is in a crisis or psychiatric emergency situation, they may be placed in inpatient acute care, which may either be at a psychiatric hospital or in the psych ward of a general hospital.
- Inpatient Residential: Someone who is placed in an inpatient residential treatment facility is typically there for a month or more. They receive the same therapies as those in an IOP program, except they also stay at the facility.
History Of Intensive Outpatient Programs
IOPs rose to popularity in the 1980s, as many White, middle-class working professionals were dealing with cocaine use and did not want to have to take time off of work. IOPs, which sometimes take place in the mornings or the evenings, may allow individuals to still keep up with their professional responsibilities and maintain income.
In the 1990s, as managed care (healthcare designed to keep costs low) grew, so did IOPs. More than just White businesspeople, the populations served expanded to include everyone from those with moderate mental health or substance issues to unhoused individuals to adolescents and those with dual diagnoses.
Data from the latest National Survey of Substance Abuse Treatment services shows a dramatic increase in the number of IOPs from 2010 through 2020, with nearly 3,000 more facilities (16,000 in total) eligible for inclusion. The number of clients served also rose from 1.2 million per year in 2010 to 1.4 million per year in 2019.
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