Overview

Individuals coping with substance use disorders can face stigma from multiple places:

The outside public
Inside the recovery community
From within - they may have very low self-esteem and self-stigmatize
Treatment Providers

To provide the best care a provider should examine their beliefs about addiction. Take a personal inventory:

What are your personal beliefs about why people become addicted?

Do You believe:

Addiction to illicit drugs is different or worse than addiction to legal drugs?
Is it easier to recover from certain addictions than others?
Some people are beyond help?
Some people are doomed to a life of addiction because of their high-risk factors?
Certain drug treatment approaches are better than others?
Abstinence-based approaches are acceptable but maintenance programs are not—or vice versa?
That recovery must “look” a certain way?

Providing better care means

Suspending judgement
Watching language choices and not defining the person by their disorder
Not generalizing

Adapted from The Danya Institute and SAMHSA

Watch this brief video illustrating how slight changes in language can improve care

Video running time 1:04

“Words are important. If you want to care for something, you call it a ‘flower’; if you want to kill something, you call it a ‘weed’.” -Don Coyhis

Separate the patient from the addiction. It is a disease, not a choice.
Help them find human connections, be more available to being someone's connection.
Bring it to other people's attention when they use language that is stigmatizing regardless of intent
Care for the patient, not the drug. Remembering that they are a person, not their disease or drug of choice.
Employ humanism
Help them build resiliency
See the person, not the drug
Empathic presence
Recognize substance use is a spectrum of choice and functionality. Not every interaction with a client/patient/participant will result in referrals to get help, but every interaction with them is a chance to show that when they are ready, the client/patient/participant has a place to turn.
Help them find purpose in their daily lives