The Latest News from Our Field

Whether you are a consumer or a provider, SAMHSA’s Partners for Recovery Initiative can help you grasp the ins and outs of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act and the recently released Interim Final Rule.

Faces & Voices of Recovery is organizing recovery and treatment advocates to ask their U.S. Representatives in Congress to join an addiction caucus focused on substance use disorders treatment and recovery.

The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act, which went into effect in Jan. 2011, mandates that insurance companies provide the same coverage for mental health services as they do for physical health services. Yet, according to a American Psychological Association survey, only 10 percent of Americans have even heard of the law.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) is taking its efforts to bridge the gap between physician education and high-quality care of patients with drug abuse to selected medical schools, and ultimately, to the World Wide Web.

Thanks to comments from public health advocates -- including many of you -- the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans do not suggest a weekly average for alcohol consumption. Consistent with current scientific evidence, the guidelines suggest up to one drink per day for women and up to two drinks per day for men for moderate consumers.

Wisconsin-based NIATx has developed a self-assessment tool for behavioral healthcare treatment providers, designed to help agency leaders determine their organization’s capacity to ’undertake the changes resulting from health care reform, parity legislation, state budget shortfalls, and increased performance accountability.’

The National Drug Court Institute (NDCI) is offering free training to juvenile drug court staff in a brief, evidence-based intervention for adolescents abusing drugs and alcohol.