Treat Substance Use Disorders via Telehealth: Essential Skills for Assessment, Treatment and Recovery Support at a Distance – Paul Brasler

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Shame. Fear. Denial. Accessibility. 

These are obstacles that people face when seeking help for substance use disorders. Each obstacle is a threat to recovery that can keep treatment dropout rates high and success rates low.

You can remove some of the biggest barriers to substance use treatment by offering telehealth as a treatment lifeline to clients fighting for their lives! 

This training will show you how you can provide effective, HIPAA-compliant substance use treatment via telehealth so you can expand accessibility, improve client retention and engagement, and provide a treatment space for those who feel uncomfortable coming to a physical office.

Join addictions treatment expert, speaker, and author Paul Brasler, MA, MSW, LCSW, and he’ll provide you with the skills you need to: 

• Navigate privacy & informed consent issues unique to telehealth 
• Remotely address safety concerns 
• Screen & assess for drug use at a distance 
• Deliver trauma-informed treatment interventions 
• Boost client engagement, even when you’re not in the same room 
• Tailor proven treatment strategies for virtual delivery 
• Apply your skills to virtual group sessions

Telehealth will continue to grow and become a more integral component of addiction treatment.

Don’t wait to add this valuable treatment format to your work! Set up your clients for recovery success! 

1. Assess telehealth considerations and their clinical implications, including when its use is contra-indicated and the need for informed consent.
2. Appraise the causes of substance use disorders and factors that reinforce drug use, including factors related to trauma and attachment, as related to case conceptualization.
3. Assess for signs and symptoms of both substance intoxication and withdrawal syndromes for alcohol, methamphetamine, and opioids.
4. Adapt substance use screening and assessment tools for delivery via telehealth.
5. Utilize clinical strategies, such as motivational interviewing, via telehealth to improve client engagement and foster behavioral change.
6. Demonstrate strategies used to improve the efficacy of individual and group therapies through telehealth.

Telehealth & Substance Use Disorders: What You Need to Know 

• Basics of telehealth: The do’s & don’ts 
• When telehealth is not appropriate 
• Virtual privacy concerns 
• What to tell your clients before starting 
• Informed consent: Why it’s different for telehealth 

The Science Behind Substance Use Disorders 

• Biopsychosocial aspects of substance abuse 
• The role of trauma & attachment 
• Compromised immune systems 
• Using while isolated: The most dangerous substances
  • Alcohol 
  • Heroin 
  • Fentanyl 
  • Meth

Telehealth Screening & Assessment: How Do You Know if a Client is Using?

• Assessment when you can’t see or smell 
• Distance drug screening: Reduce potential harm 
• How to ask sensitive intake questions 
• Screening tools you can use at a distance

Remote Treatment Planning & Delivery 

• Client-reported withdrawal screenings 
• Making level of care decisions remotely 
• Withdrawal management alone is not treatment 
• Withdrawal management protocols & support through telehealth 
• Inpatient or outpatient treatment? 
• Medication-assisted treatment

Motivational Interviewing 

• Stages of change
• Key strategies of motivational interviewing 
• Relapse prevention strategies 
• What to do when clients relapse

Distance Cognitive-Behavioral Interventions 

• Apply the A-B-C model to substance abuse 
• Recognize triggers to use via telehealth 
• Foster coping skills 
• Deconstruct negative schemas

Strategies for Group Telehealth 

• Tailor interventions for virtual groups 
• Barriers to treatment 
• Getting people to talk 
• Referring to virtual 12-step groups

More Strategies to Improve Client Engagement & Get Treatment Buy-In

• Showing empathy without nonverbal cues 
• Case management: Link the client to resources 
• Medication-assisted treatment 

Special Clinical Situations

• Pregnancy: Stigma & other challenges 
• Parents of young children 
• Vicarious trauma with a high-stress population 
• Limitations of the research & potential risks