THE PARENTS TRANSLATIONAL RESEARCH CENTER
AT THE TREATMENT RESEARCH INSTITUTE
Director: Kimberly C. Kirby, Ph.D.
Once substance use starts, there is a need for earlier interventions to arrest the progression toward addiction. Continuing care interventions are also needed - within the home and community during and following formal treatment - to enhance, maintain, and extend treatment gains. This is especially critical when dealing with adolescent substance use problems which can be associated with a variety of significant health and safety consequences including violence, car accidents, and premature death.
Seeded with funding from the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the solutions-oriented Parents Translational Research Center (“Center”) begins with the view that parents could and would like to play an important role in managing the challenges of having an adolescent with a substance use problem. To maximize parents’ influence, it is preferable that they use evidence-based knowledge, instruction, skills and practical tools. Thus, the focus on parents and the use of translational research methods come together to define the Center theme: translation of key elements from proven clinical interventions into practical tools for parents to use in addressing the substance use problems of their adolescents.View Center presentations.The Center deploys an experienced team of multidisciplinary researchers at TRI, supported by communications expertise from the Partnership at Drugfree.org, and expert scientific and parent advisory boards. Three initial research projects address various stages of adolescent drug involvement: 1) adaptation and testing of a brief intervention for parents when they initially discover substance use by their adolescent; 2) development of a Consumer Guide to Addiction Treatment for parents seeking treatment for their child to provide comparative information about the number and types of evidence-based clinical practices available in community treatment programs; and 3) adaptation and testing of a Community Reinforcement and Family Training program (CRAFT) that will train parents to engage treatment-resistant adolescents into treatment and continuing care.
The knowledge from these and other science-informed Center projects will be translated into practical tools and disseminated to parents and other adult caregivers.
Parents as Interventionists for Moderate Drug Abusing Adolescents
Developing a Consumer Guide to Adolescent Drug Treatment
CRAFT: Helping Parents Initiate & Support their Adolescent’s Treatment