Examining Sustained Recovery from Substance Use Disorder — A Delicate Process

Examining Sustained Recovery from Substance Use Disorder — A Delicate Process.
The National Institute on Drug Abuse defines long-term recovery as a process of change through which people
improve their health and wellness, live self-directed lives, and strive to reach their full potential.
Even people with severe and chronic substance use disorders can, with help, overcome their illness and
regain health and social function; this is called remission.
But as also poignantly stated by the NIDA Director, Dr. Nora Volkow, resolving the radiating impacts of a substance use disorder on an individual’s life are also crucial elements of the recovery process.
The Midwest is the latest region in the US to experience an epidemic of synthetic opioid substance abuse following locales like Los Angeles, Miami, Pennsylvania, the Appalachian region, and practically the entire East Coast.
Taken together, this epidemic is spreading across race, class, and region at a rate and extent that has NEVER been
seen in the United States. This epidemic brings death and destruction in its wake.
This abuse epidemic brings to the fore one critical component of studies examining successful sustained recovery; it
should include greater involvement of people with lived experience in research design, methodologies, and critical focal points of what elements aided their own experiences as they battled their own barriers to recovery. As stated by others, the science of “recovery supports” is emblematic of how successful that mindset can be. The Substance Abuse Subtle Screening Inventory Institute is providing this short commentary to hopefully provide a guiding template indicative of how the SUD field might discover these elements of “a successful recovery” experience from the perspective of those living their lives in remission.

Soc Behav Res Pract Open J. 2023; 8(1): 8-12.doi: 10.17140/SBRPOJ-8-136