Drug addiction remains one of the most prominent social problems in Canadian society. According to the results of the Canadian Drug Use and Monitoring Survey (CADUMS), the number of Canadians who are abusing illicit drugs has been rising steadily from 2004 to 2012. Additionally, information about drug use in Canada from other recent surveys indicates that many young people in Canada are getting introduced to the practice of using illicit drugs. From these figures, it is apparent that there is a need for concerted efforts by individuals and institutions to help the victims of the substance abuse.
Rehabilitation is so far the exclusive method that is used to help anyone addicted to alcohol and drugs. However, the efficacy of this method is overshadowed often by the costs involved. Many people who have undergone the process note that it is difficult to estimate the total amount that you may use in the process. The reason for this is simple: several factors determine the amount of money that you will be required to pay to undergo a full rehabilitation session. Therefore, it is essential to have a clear understanding of all the issues that are involved in the rehabilitation process and which determine the ultimate cost.
In this guide, you will learn about the different elements of the cost of drug addiction, the relationship between treatment methods and costs and how you can ensure that you get a program that is affordable yet effective.
Private versus Public Addiction Rehabilitation Cost
If you are seeking addiction rehabilitation services in Canada, then you can go for either public or private facilities. Although both forms of rehabilitation centers can help you or your loved one overcome addiction to substances and alcohol, they differ in the way that they operate. Primarily, public rehabilitation centers are part of the free health care system that the government provides (covered under OHIP). Therefore, if you are a citizen and you need to get rehabilitated from addiction, then you are free to visit any public healthcare facility and access the services.
However, the nature of the free public healthcare system poses some challenges to anyone who decides to access the free rehabilitation services. The number of people who are seeking rehabilitation services in Canada remains very high. Figures published by the Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction in the National Treatment Indicators Report for 2014 and 2015 indicate that as the total number of individuals seeking treatment rises, the public health care system has made changes to cope with the growing number.
If you decide to go to a public rehabilitation center, then you must be ready to cope with the delays that everyone faces under such circumstances. Once you get registered for the services, you join the waiting list for quite some time. For practicality, it may not be prudent to wait for months to take your loved ones for treatment if drug addiction has severely affected the person.
Apart from the long queues and extended waiting periods, public rehabilitation centers in the country do not offer the highly personalized attention and treatment that some people require.
In general, trained therapists and other professionals face much pressure because of the considerable number of patients whom they need to attend to every day. Therefore, many public facilities do not offer personalized services that you may find in private rehabs.
If you are not willing to go to public rehabilitation centers, you may try private ones. Private centers tend to be more expensive because they do not get funding from the government.
Attending a private rehabilitation center can be as costly as $300 CAD, depending on the services offered. Most private facilities charge so much because of the personalized treatment and extensive therapy patients receive.
At Addiction Rehab Toronto, we offer 30, 45, 60 and 90 day treatment programs. The costs associated with treatment vary depending on a number of factors. To get more info about our programs and costs, give us a call at (855) 558-8461.
Inpatient versus outpatient treatment costs
The kind of treatment that you receive as part of your rehabilitation determines the total cost of the process. For inpatient rehabilitation, you will have to relocate from your home to a rehabilitation center for the period in which you will overcome your addiction.
The basis of using inpatient rehabilitation services is that some addicts may not manage to overcome their addiction if left in their homes. Usually, dependence is built on a range of factors which act as triggers and habits. If a person is in an environment in which the factors that contribute to drug use are prevalent, then it may not be easy to help the individual overcome the temptation to abuse substances. In such cases, professional therapists recommend that a patient undergo treatment while living in a rehabilitation center.
The centers are made to provide a unique environment that can help you overcome your dependence on drugs with relative ease. One of the noticeable things, when you visit a rehab center for a stay-in program, is that the therapists directly control the daily lives of all clients. It is the work of the professionals to develop a schedule of all the activities that you will undertake and ensure that you follow the regime. Moreover, the therapists keep an eye on you to ensure that you do not fail during the treatment.
It is because of all these services that inpatient rehabilitation programs are costlier than outpatient ones. Whether you visit a private or a public rehab, you will notice that the cost of inpatient programs exceeds that of outpatient therapies by far. For instance, Sunshine Coast Health Centre is one of Canada’s top private alcohol treatment and drug rehabilitation centers offering men inpatient services at an average cost of $650 per day for the first 30 days.
Outpatient rehabilitation is for people who have less severe forms of addiction. Outpatient programs of different types tend to cost anyplace between $100 and $500 per treatment session. If you choose this form of treatment for addiction, you will only have to be visiting your therapist during specific days of the week. Moreover, under outpatient rehabilitation services, the procedure is usually spread over a long time to allow the patient to develop the ability to identify and overcome triggers to using drugs. Therefore, the fact that this form of treatment does not require an individual to use the boarding facilities of any rehabilitation center means that it costs far much less than inpatient rehabilitation programs.
Length of treatment and rehabilitation costs
There is a direct relationship between the period that you take in a rehabilitation center and the level of effectiveness of treatment. In practice, individuals affected by drug abuse and spend more time undergoing treatment tend to overcome the problem faster than those who take time-constrained rehabilitation treatments. The reason for this observation is simple; once therapists start to get positive outcomes, it is necessary to maintain the trend for one to fully recover from addiction. Therefore, when you undertake a treatment program for long, it is easy for your therapists to keep an eye on you to ensure that you can stand on your feet at the end and avoid a relapse.
In-house rehabilitation is costly because of multiple reasons, other than just the use of boarding facilities that found in rehabs. One common factor that determines the cost of an in-house versus an outpatient rehabilitation program is the seriousness of the addiction. Patients who suffer from severe addiction need much time to overcome the problem. A person who has been abusing drugs for years may end up staying in a rehabilitation center for many months before they are free to resume their healthy lives.
Moreover, the abuse of various drugs leads to polysubstance dependence, which is a dire condition. Usually, individuals who suffer from this disorder experience more adverse effects than those who are addicted to only one substance. It follows that if you have polysubstance dependence, you will end up spending much time in rehabilitation centers than the counterpart addicted to one substance. The specialized treatment that doctors must administer to such a patient inadvertently translates to prohibitive costs.
Type of Treatment and Rehabilitation Costs
There is no single method of treating drug addiction. Research in the area focuses on identifying broad ways that combine various tactics to treat specific forms of addiction. Hence, it is in the practice to describe treatments for drug addiction under broad categories. The classes usually are based on the similarity of methods that therapists use to address the problems of their patients.
One of the most common approaches to treating drug addiction use today is the Therapeutic Community. For this form of treatment of addiction, a patient is supposed to stay at a facility for long. Extended stays are necessary for therapists to help the patient to learn to socialize with a new group of individuals. By so doing, therapists help a patient to identify and break the habits that support substance abuse. This form of treatment is the costliest one because a patient must use the facilities of a rehabilitation center for many months.
Read about: How to Get Off DUI Charges with Rehab Program
On the other hand, outpatient treatment programs, or Intensive Outpatient Programs, as they are known, cost much less than inpatient ones. Frequently, patients who are not severely addicted to substances are generally allowed to take this form of treatment. Primarily, outpatient treatment is cheaper than some other methods because patients do not have to pay for using boarding amenities found in rehabilitation centers. Furthermore, this method of therapy costs less than others because it does not involve detoxification and 24/7 surveillance.
An alternative method of treatment which has a direct effect on the cost of rehabilitation is the Do-It-Yourself method. There is much controversy about the efficacy of self-help methods to cure drug addiction. On the one hand, it’s argued that the process can be slightly useful for individuals who have minor drug addiction problems. On the other hand, it’s pointed out that the method may not be reliable and that there is a need for further research. The bottom-line of the debate about this method is, because of its low costs, it’s a better option. However, based on the condition of an individual, it may be wiser to make the decision on the method of treatment to be used on what works best.
Thus, the method that one chooses determines the cost of the rehabilitation process. In most cases, patients are required to take medications to cure conditions related to withdrawal symptoms, thus increasing the total cost of the program.
Funding drug rehabilitation programs
The most common method of funding rehabilitation programs is by private means. Using this approach may cover all the aspects of the treatment method, whether it involves a patient staying at the rehabilitation center for months or any of the techniques that take a brief period to completion.
Some insurance companies offer special plans to cover for drug rehabilitation programs. Private insurance packages that cover the costs of rehabilitation are typically costlier than those who do not include treatment for drug addiction.
At Addiction Rehab Toronto, we offer affordable, low monthly payment options through Medicard. Give us a call at (855) 558-8461 to find out more.
The Cost of Drug Addiction
After considering all the factors that determine the cost of drug addiction rehab, the most crucial question is as follows: is it worth it? In answering this question, it is necessary to compare the cost of an addiction to that of undergoing a rehabilitation program. Typically, the cost of addiction may cover various things such as the money that a person spends on buying the drugs, the effect of an overdose and losses associated with overall addiction.
Narcotics are expensive. According to the United Nations World Drugs Report, the prices of the most common drugs, including heroin and cocaine vary considerably across the regions of the world. For example, one gram of heroin is said to retail from between CAD 53 and 60, depending on the location. In most of the European countries, the cost of the narcotics may be higher than these figures because of the demand and supply dynamics of the market. When you consider the compounded financial burden of having to buy and use drugs daily, it is apparent that the direct cost of addiction can be overbearing at the personal level.
In some cases, you and your family may end up spending much more if you happen to experience an overdose Drug overdose is one of the significant health issues across the world. According to the Canadian Government, about 92% of the 3,987 deaths related to drug abuse that occurred back in 2017 were accidental. The figures mean that there are very high chances that a drug user can die from an overdose.
Apart from death, incidents of a drug overdose come with many health problems. An overdose of a typical drug like cocaine usually produces adverse side effects. Moreover, the consequences may be fatal, depending on the time that it takes for one to get medical attention. Interestingly, studies show that the cost of treatment for accidental drug overdoses has been on a steady rise in the recent past. Thus, these two trends indicate that the cost of maintaining a lifestyle of using drugs outweighs that of undergoing rehabilitation.
Apart from the costs associated with purchasing drugs of getting medical attention after an overdose accident, one must spend a lot of money when caught using drugs. The legal implications of being found in possession of drugs are quite discouraging. It has been the tradition of all jurisdictions to give severe punishments to people found with prohibited drugs. Legal Line estimates that the average cost of managing a legal case related to drugs is $9,000. Therefore, it’s arguable that the cost of maintaining a lifestyle of using drugs is more than that of undergoing rehabilitation.
Final Analysis on the cost
In conclusion, an analysis of the cost of using drugs shows that you stand to benefit from undergoing rehabilitation. The direct costs of purchasing the drugs to maintain the addiction may be much more than what you and your family may spend on treatment. Moreover, there are many other hidden costs to drug addiction that people deliberately ignore. If you find yourself in trouble with the authorities for using drugs, then you will be forced to spend much money to avoid getting jailed. It is because of these reasons that you should consider going for a rehabilitation program.
Although the cost of a rehabilitation program depends on factors like the length of stay, treatment approaches and facilities at any given rehab, you end up saving a lot of money that would otherwise vanish because of the addiction. Additionally, there are many options that you can use to reduce the total cost of an addiction rehabilitation program. Begin by checking whether your insurer covers for such treatment plans before you decide on the specific kind of treatment that you think you can comfortably afford.
