An exploration of the process of recovery from heroin dependence

• Main Author: Shaw, Elizabeth H.
• Published: University of Hull 2011
• Subjects: 616.863207; Medicine Psychology
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.550463

This review aimed to collate information regarding the psychological and sociological factors that contribute to recovery from heroin dependence. Systematic searches (manual and electronic) using the databases PsychInfo, PsychArticles, Medline, CINAHL, Scopus and Web of Science were undertaken. Six themes were identified: the role of social factors in the engagement of heroin users with services, psycho-social factors associated with motivation to stop heroin use, the role of motivation in achieving abstinence from heroin, the role of confidence/self-efficacy in reduction of heroin consumption, coping strategies and heroin abstinence and the theme of how social factors aid the transition from addict to non-addict identity. The development of non-drug using relationships and coping strategies was associated with abstinence from heroin, identifying points for intervention by drug treatment services. Self-confidence for remaining abstinent from heroin at admission to treatment was found to be un-related to heroin use following treatment. Confidence surrounding cessation of heroin use was dependent on receiving substitution medication. Drug services may play an important role in increasing past heroin users‟ self-efficacy with regard to living without heroin and substitution treatment. Throughout the literature, „recovery‟ was viewed as engagement with services and abstinence from heroin use. It seemed that this conceptualization of recovery was inconsistent with that provided by the latest government policy and that more research is required to discover how people receiving MMT and people working in drug services view recovery from heroin dependence.