Gate House for Women
(717) 285-2300
www.gatehouse.org
465 West Main Street
Mountville PA 17554

Rehabilitation Services

Primary Focus: Substance abuse treatment services
Services Provided: Substance abuse treatment, Halfway house
Type of Care: Residential short-term treatment (30 days or less), Residential long-term treatment (more than 30 days)
Special Programs/Groups: Women

Retainer Medicine

Retainer medicine is practiced by physicians who have decided to drop out of all third party payer programs. These practitioners have offered a limited number of patients the opportunity to pay a fixed annual fee in exchange for premium services and amenities. Retainers doctors generally limit, by a drastic amount, the number of patients, which they will service. This makes the most sense for primary care physicians and those specialists who have ongoing and regular relationships with their patients. Many retainer practices also provide amenities which patients often do not get when Medicare or an insurer pays the doctor, including access to the physician’s cell phone, e-mail correspondence, same-day appointments, and plenty of face time during appointments. However, whatever the specifics of a particular practice may be, the key that defines “retainer medicine” is that the doctor works for the patient. It has become impossible in practical terms and in ethical terms for traditional primary care physicians to fight the pervasive pressures upon them to ration healthcare at the bedside. To escape this fate, they must become either specialists or a retainer practitioner. That is, primary care physicians must choose between remaining in a system that ruthlessly pushes them toward a practice of bedside rationing or, one way or another, getting out of traditional primary care medicine altogether. Retainer medicine restores the professional integrity of medical practice, and re-establishes a doctor-patient relationship in which the physician can again assume the duty of a true advocate. It is perhaps the only remaining means to restore the foundational medical ethic of always placing the patient first. Retainer fees let one practice handle more patients by phone or email.

Gambling Addiction Methadone, buprenorphine and, for some individuals, naltrexone are effective medications for treating opiate addictions. Acting on the same targets in the brain as heroin and morphine, methadone and buprenorphine suppress withdrawal symptoms and relieve cravings. Naltrexone works by blocking the effects of heroin or other opioids at their receptor sites and doctors only prescribe these drugs for certain patients who underwent detoxification. Because of compliance issues, naltrexone is not as widely used as other medications. All medication helps patients disengage from seeking out drugs and other criminal behavior, and aid addicts in being more receptive to behavioral treatments. Gambling Rehab Multidimensional family therapy, which targets adolescents with drug abuse problems as well as their families, addresses a range of drug abuse influences like patterns of abuse, and therapists seek to improve overall family functioning. Motivational interviewing, which capitalizes on the readiness of individuals to change their behavior and enter treatment, and motivational incentives use positive reinforcement to encourage abstinence from drugs. Addiction Rehab Sex Outpatient behavioral treatment encompasses a wide variety of programs for patients who regularly visit a clinic. Most of these programs involve individual or group drug counseling. Some programs also offer other forms of behavioral treatment such as cognitive behavioral therapy, which seeks to help patients recognize, avoid and cope with the situations wherein the patients are most likely to abuse drugs. Treatment Residential treatment programs can also be very effective treatment methods for recovering addicts, especially for those with more severe problems. For example, therapeutic communities offer highly structured programs in which patients remain at a residence, typically for 6 to 12 months. Therapeutic communities differ from other treatment approaches principally in their use of the community treatment staff and those in recovery as a key agent of change to influence patient attitudes, perceptions and behaviors associated with drug use. Patients in therapeutic communities may include those with relatively long histories of drug addiction, involvement in serious criminal activities and seriously impaired social functioning. Experts are now designing certain therapeutic communities to accommodate the needs of women who are pregnant or have children. The focus of the therapeutic is re-socialization. The patient will learn to live without drugs and crime. Rehab

Driving Stoned

While no one contests the implications of drinking and driving, there is public policy debate concerning driving while stoned. Studies indicate that acute marijuana use can mildly impair psychomotor skills, but it is usually not severe or long lasting. Minor impairments in tracking, eye movement control and reaction time appear in close course and driving simulator studies. These studies also indicate that marijuana users tend to increase the distance between the vehicle ahead and to decrease overall driving speed. Overall the impairments exhibited by marijuana users are much less severe than those who consume alcohol. Unlike impaired alcoholic drivers, marijuana users are often aware of the impairment and adjust some driving habits accordingly, like by driving with more caution or putting off driving altogether until the driver feels competent to do so.

Not a High Level of Accidents

The impairment resulting from low level marijuana use does not indicate a high level of on-road traffic accidents. A National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study reported there was no indication that cannabis use was a cause of fatal crashes among drivers who tested positive for the drug. A study published by the Canadian Journal of Public Health that reviewed 10 years of United States auto fatalities found that drivers with a blood alcohol levels of 0.05 (a level below the legal limit of 0.08), were three times more likely to engage in unsafe driving practices that preceded a fatal crash than people who tested positive for marijuana use. A study in France revealed a similar conclusion, finding that drivers with blood alcohol levels not exceeding 0.05 had four times the risk of having a fatal accident than marijuana users who tested positive for high levels of cannabis, above 5 ng/ml. Both studies indicate that overall few traffic accidents were due to a driver operating a vehicle while impaired by marijuana use.
Driving while consuming marijuana is not a recommended activity. Since the psychomotor impairment from marijuana use is relatively minor and transitory it is advisable that users wait a few hours before operating their vehicles.
Source: http://www.norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=7459