Afrocentric Treatment of African American Women and Their Children in a Residential Chemical Dependency Program

Since the late 1970s and early 1980s when the so-called war was declared on drugs in America, little attention to treatment has been focused on African American women. Even less attention has been given to their children in treatment. Even when the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) made an attempt to refocus attention by awarding more funding to research and treatment (Rosenbaum & Murphy, 1981), these funds focused on women, but did not specify treatment and research with their children. Current drug treatment programs continue to make attempts to measure treatment outcomes based on an Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) model of treatment. It is possible that this model alone produces barriers to treatment of African American women and their children rather than yielding success. It is widely known that African American women are disproportionately represented among the ranks of those who suffer from the abuse of alcohol or other drugs. Consequently, many African American women eventually find themselves in some form of treatment because of these problems and the added fear of losing their children. Professionals are increasingly realizing that many substance abuse treatment programs may not serve the needs of their female African American clients because (a) there is a focus on the AA model only, (b) there are few agencies that provide