Utah has witnessed a rise in the cases of dual diagnosis. This happens when you receive a diagnosis for both a substance use disorder as well as a co-occurring mental health disorder. For instance, you might be struggling with an anxiety disorder as well as an addiction involving alcohol or marijuana.
Over time, the fields of mental health treatment and addiction rehabilitation have been evolving. Through this evolution, it has been realized that these disorders sometimes occur at the same time in the same individuals. When this happens, it is known as a dual diagnosis.
To offer the right treatment process for a dual diagnosis, there are integrated recovery options available. These options will provide recovery services for both the addiction as well as the co-occurring mental health disorder that you have been struggling with.
In the process, you will get the combined treatment services that you need to overcome all of these disorders from the same treatment or clinical team. Additionally, you will be able to develop the support, skills, knowledge, understanding, and hope that you need to deal with all the problems that you have been struggling with as well as achieve long term recovery.
Research studies conducted since the 1990s have improved the general understanding of mental health and addiction - as well as how these conditions affect each other. Before then, these conditions were often treated as separate illnesses. this means that if you were mentally ill, you would get help from a mental health facility. On the other hand, if you were abusing drugs and drinking alcohol excessively, you would be treated at an addiction rehabilitation and recovery center.
Over time, however, researchers began realizing that these conditions were interlinked and that they often caused each other. For instance, if you were addicted to drugs and alcohol, you had a high likelihood of developing a mental health disorder. On the other hand, if you were living with an untreated and unmanaged mental illness, you had a high risk of abusing drugs and alcohol and ending up with a substance use disorder.
As a result, integrated treatment programs came into being to provide the dual diagnosis recovery options that people who are struggling with addiction and a co-occurring mental health disorder need to achieve full recovery. These options treat these conditions concurrently to ensure that clients overcome all of them.
Today, there is an improved understanding of the importance of integrated dual diagnosis treatment services. this is due to the lessons that the mistakes that happened in the past have imparted on professionals working in the addiction and mental health treatment fields.
Although receiving a dual diagnosis might be simply, understanding the relationship between the substance use disorder and the co-occurring mental or behavioral health disorder can be relatively difficult. This is why it is recommended that you find an integrated center in Utah to help you overcome all of these disorders.
That said, NAMI - the National Alliance on Mental Illness - reports that the relationship between all these co-occurring disorders tend to be complex. For instance, you might start with a mental illness and eventually abuse drugs and alcohol to self-medicate the symptoms and effects of this illness.
Although this might work in the short term, it will only worsen your mental health disorder. This is because the substances you abuse will interact with your brain as well as with its communication system. This could cause you to develop additional vulnerabilities in your psychological state.
To this end, if you give up the drugs and alcohol that you were abusing, you could experience withdrawal symptoms - which could exacerbate the effects of all of the conditions that you have been struggling with.
Substance abuse will not only increase your psychological problems, it can also cause you to develop other mental health disorders. In some instances, these disorders could develop after using drugs just a couple of times.
This is because the side effects of certain drugs - particularly illicit substances - can be dangerous and unpredictable. To this end, it is possible for you to experience mental illnesses after using drugs even if you might not have experienced these side effects in the past.
A dual diagnosis occurs when you are struggling with both a substance use disorder as well as a co-occurring mental health disorder. You might even be dealing with more than one psychological problem. That said, if you were just diagnosed with two disorders - one involving addiction and the other affecting your mental health - it could also qualify as a dual diagnosis.
In many cases, you might be suffering from this condition while remaining unaware that you have other psychological and behavioral health concerns over and above your substance abuse and addiction in Utah. This is because your ongoing drug and alcohol abuse could have masked the mental health disorders that you were dealing with. As a result, your mental illness might have gone undetected.
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The problem of a dual diagnosis is two-fold. This is because your mental illness might not have been managed - on one hand - while your addiction could continue exacerbating its symptoms - on the other hand.
The drugs that were initially helping you to cope with your mental illness in Utah could eventually cause you to experience more aggravated effects of this illness. As a result, you will find that you have to take these substances in higher doses or more frequently than you used to before you can achieve the effects that you desire.
But how can you tell that you are living with a dual diagnosis in Utah? Essentially, there are some issues that act as signs and symptoms of a dual diagnosis of addiction and a co-occurring mental health disorder.
These issues include interpersonal problems, legal issues, driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol, engaging in highly risky behavior, a recurrence of mental illness symptoms, relapse even after being admitted in an addiction treatment center, more frequent than normal admissions to emergency rooms, and an increase in your need for the acute care services that could help you achieve full recovery.
But which are the most common mental health disorders that tend to occur with addiction in Utah? Studies show that many people in this state struggle with clinical depression. Others deal with psychological distress.
Additionally, 56 percent of all the residents of Utah with manic depressive illness (or bipolar disorder) abuse drugs and alcohol. this is also the case with 47 percent of people living with schizophrenic disorders, 32 percent of people with mood disorders (other than bipolar disorder), and 37 percent of residents with anxiety disorders. Other research findings indicate that 60 to 80 percent of the residents of the state receiving addiction treatment services also have a co-occurring mental health disorder.
That said, the most common co-occurring mental illnesses among the residents of Utah struggling with substance abuse and addiction include but are not limited to post-traumatic stress disorder, personality disorders, oppositional defiant disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, narcissism, mild eating disorders, histrionic disorders, high functioning autism spectrum disorders, depression, borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety, and anti-social disorders, among many others.
It can be extremely difficult to overcome your addiction as well as your co-occurring mental health disorder if you only seek treatment services for either of these conditions without getting the other one managed. This is why it is recommended that you get help from an integrated dual diagnosis treatment center in Utah.
These centers will provide you with the best therapeutic practices to ensure that thy manage all of these disorders. Additionally, they will offer the interdisciplinary and intensive care that you need to heal from your substance abuse and addiction as well as address your co-occurring mental illness.
Some of the treatment methods that will be provided to guide you on the road to recovery include but are not limited to staying at sober or transitional living facilities, relapse prevention, motivational interviewing, medication management, medically supervised detoxification, individual therapy, group therapy, family therapy, drug rehabilitation, dialectical behavioral therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, codependency treatment, alcohol treatment, aftercare planning and programming, and 12-step support group participation.
To ensure that you achieve recovery in the long term, you will first go through a thorough assessment and evaluation when you check into the rehabilitation facility. This way, the center will be able to tell if you have a dual diagnosis for both substances abuse as well as a co-occurring psychological disorder.
After that, they will create a highly individualized treatment program comprised of various recovery services to help you achieve health and wellness. This program will involve integrated dual diagnosis treatment services to manage both your substance abuse as well as your co-occurring disorder at the same time.
It is recommended that you seek help from such an integrated dual diagnosis treatment center if you suspect that you might be struggling with a drug or alcohol addiction as well as a co-occurring mental health disorder. This is the only way you will be able to overcome all of these disorders.
Learning what treatment is best for you or your loved one is easy. Speak to one of our trained counselors and let them guide you to the best treatment options available for your specific needs.
