Many addiction rehab programs offer more than one method of treatment for helping their patients. This is commonly known as combination therapy.

Like everything else, there are both benefits and drawbacks when a treatment center employs multiple modes to treat its patients. Experts have different opinions on whether combination therapy or focusing on one method is better, but in reality the results probably vary from person to person. A popular example of this is a facility that uses cognitive behavioral therapy along with a twelve step program. Other programs may choose some combination of psychotherapy, spirituality, or substitution therapy, among others.The obvious advantage of combination therapy is that patients get to benefit from multiple theories. If they find that one addiction treatment method doesn’t work for them, perhaps the other one will. For someone who can’t relate to the twelve steps, a program that also offers cognitive behavioral therapy can still be effective. Different types of patients may be able to find successful addiction recovery in a single facility that provides them with options. There is a greater likelihood of finding a good match, when the time may have otherwise been wasted in a treatment center where the patient didn’t relate to the one theory that was being communicated to them.

One the other hand, a drug rehab program that provides combination therapy is not focusing one single method. This may diminish the quality of the ones that they do use. Also, the patient may have difficulty integrating two different theories that they are being taught, especially in the hazy period after drug and alcohol abuse. If they are given a choice of which one to follow when they’re in the rehab facility, they may find it a difficult decision to make when fear of failure is a big component.

Popularity: 2% [?]