Referrers do not have written materials with directions and guidance for clients to use to contact addiction treatment.
Create customized brochures for each of your referral sources to provide contact information and descriptions of your services that are specific to the clients served by each referral source.
St. Christopher’s Inn in Garrison, New York developed a brochure that can easily be customized for each referral source. It includes a section that can easily be changed for different referral sources, entitled: “Why Program Name would make a referral to St. Christopher’s Inn.” The brochure includes successful outcomes—such as the percentage of clients who graduated, remained abstinent, and obtained a job. The brochure also includes a personal story about a client. See their sample brochure. For further information see St. Christopher’s Inn case study.
Women’s Recovery Association in Burlingame, California created a brochure for referral sources that are likely to make referrals to their evening intensive outpatient program, including private pay, fee-for-service contracts (mostly criminal justice clients and women with small children), county funding, and hospitals. See the WRA EIOP Brochure.
Cycle Measure
Percentage of referred clients who were admitted
Data Collection Forms
Plan
Do
Study
Act
If this change was not an improvement and you can’t make it work, abandon this practice and test other promising practices that might be more successful in your setting.