Universal Treatment Curriculum

UTC 1: Introduction to the Science of Addiction

This course provides the foundation for understanding the science of addiction. It gives an overview of the physiology of addiction as a brain disease and pharmacology of psychoactive substances.

UTC 2: Treatment for Substance Use Disorders–The Continuum of Care for Addiction Professionals

The course provides the foundation for learning about substance use disorder(SUD) treatment. It gives an overview of recovery and recovery management, stages of change, principles of effective treatment, components of treatment and evidence-based practices.

UTC 3: Common Co-occurring Mental and Medical Disorders- An Overview for Addiction Professionals

This course offers an overview of the relationship between co-occurring mental and SUD-related treatment issues.

UTC 4: Basic Counselling Skills for Addiction Professionals

This course focusses on an overview of the helping relationship and the opportunity to practice core counselling including basic skills in motivational interviewing, group counselling and implementation of psychoeducation sessions.

UTC 5: Screening, Intake, Assessment, Treatment Planning and Documentation for Addiction Professionals

This course is a skills-based course that teaches effective and integrated intake, screening, assessment, treatment planning and documentation procedures to addiction professionals.

UTC 6: Case Management for Addiction Professionals

This is a skills-based course that provides an overview of case management in the treatment of substance use disorders and provides skills in case management.

UTC 7: Crisis Intervention for Addiction Professionals

This course addresses the concept of crisis as a part of life and provides guidelines for crisis intervention, including managing suicide risk. It also addresses ways counsellors can avoid personal crisis situations by providing information and exercises about counsellor self-care.

UTC 8: Ethics for Addiction Professionals

This course addresses professional conduct and ethical behaviour in SUD treatment that covers confidentiality, ethical principles and professional code of ethics. It provides the opportunity to learn and practice the use of an ethical decisionmaking model through case study analyses.

UTC 9: Advanced Pharmacology and Substance Use Disorders

This 3-days course provides an overview of pharmacology through the identification of the classification of drugs based on their effects on the central nervous system and addiction potential. It provides an understanding of the role of neurotransmitters in the development of addiction and the psychological implications on substance use disorders.

UTC 10: Managing Medication Assisted Treatment Programs

This 4-days course provides a comprehensive understanding of the importance of medication in SUD treatment and its benefits when used in conjunction with psychosocial interventions.

This course is designed for those persons who are interested in understanding the “How To’s” in developing and establishing a Medicated Assisted Program. The participants attending will be informed about treatment recommendations, background information and historical review of available evidence- base services for pharmacotherapies and practice guidelines for pharmacotherapy services.

UTC 11: Enhancing Motivational Interviewing Skills

This 5-days course provides an understanding of the theory and application of Motivational Interviewing strategies and interventions for SUD treatment.

UTC 12: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

This 4-days course provides an overview of cognitive – behaviour therapy goals, techniques and its application to treatment of people with substance use disorders and comorbid disorders.

These skills equip the professionals with the skills to help people with SUDs to recognize and cope with craving, managing thoughts about substance use, problem solving, planning for emergencies and refusal skills. Hence, these skills are widely used in relapse prevention.

UTC 13: Contingency Management

This 3-days course is a foundational course that provides an understanding of the theories and principles of reinforcement-based treatment, in general, with specific focus on the Contingency Management approach.

UTC 14: Working with Families

This 5-days course provides a comprehensive overview for SUD treatment practitioners working with families who are dealing with substance use disorders.

UTC 15: Skills for Managing Co-Occurring Disorders

This 3-days skills-based course enhances participants understanding of co-occurring disorders, substance-related disorders, and mental disorders.

UTC 16: Advanced Clinical Skills and Crisis Management

This 5-days course provides an in-depth understanding of the theories of counselling and the application of its therapeutic techniques in various SUD treatment settings.

On-the-job skills such as training and supervision skills are addressed in this course that will enhance counsellors’ skills to evaluate their treatment services for possible adoption of methods from various treatment interventions.

UTC 17: Case Management Skills and Practices

This 3.5-days course is designed to provide the opportunity to enhance competency in case management through a better understanding of the important roles and skills of case managers.

It further describes the key functions, applications, assessment, management plan, advocacy and evaluation within a case management context. This approach focuses on assisting the client in accessing needed services or resources throughout the continuum of care and assist them by focusing on the outcome of treatment services.

UTC 18: Clinical Supervision

This 5-days course provides an overview of the fundamentals, principles, models and methods of clinical supervision. This is also meant to lay out the roles, functions, skills and competencies of clinical supervisors.

These are the skills that clinical supervisors will need to positively impact the development of counselors and treatment programs in delivering SUD treatment services. Participants will gain an understanding of the roles, functions, skills, and competencies of clinical supervisors in this course.

UTC 19: Enhancing Group Facilitation Skills

This 3.5-days course is a skills-based course that enhances group facilitation skills of SUD treatment practitioners.

This method is used to support and guide people with similar problems or issues seeking advice or meeting to discuss issues. It enables a small of group of persons with SUDs to meet regularly to talk, interact, and discuss problems with each other and the group facilitator. It centers around understanding of group processes, concepts, models and methods through experiential learning.

UTC 20: Populations with Special Clinical Needs

This 6-days specialised course provides basic tools necessary to help meet the needs of a broad and diverse array of individuals with substance use disorders, provide and/or improve access to quality treatment services that address the issues of diversity and address the unique mental health needs of the communities’ different population groups.

UTC 21: Trauma-Informed Care for Adults

This 4- days course provides information about trauma, its prevalence among people with substance use disorders, and impact on treatment and recovery as many researches found that trauma is associated with higher risk of later substance use and also substance use itself in turn can predispose people to higher rates of trauma.

UTC 22: Recovery management and Relapse Prevention

This 4-days course provides a foundational understanding of recovery management and relapse prevention. It covers discussion on the process of recovery, the variance from treatment as well as the elements of relapse and relapse prevention.

The Child Intervention for Living Drug-Free (CHILD) Curriculum

Child Intervention for Living Drug-Free (CHILD) Curriculum provides treatment providers with the tools they need to identify, assess, and treat children with substance use disorders (SUDs) using age-appropriate interventions and methodologies.

It is a six-course training programme that responds to the needs of children and their caregivers impacted by substance use and life circumstances of various social, cultural, economic, and political situations.

Women’s Intervention for Substance Exposure: Comprehensive Care for Substance Use Disorder (WISE)

The WISE Curriculum was created to increase understanding of women’s unique treatment needs and how to address them through practical knowledge and techniques. The four-course curriculum specifies how treating women for substance use disorders differs from treating those of men, and how to respond to women’s needs appropriately. It offers participants the tools and strategies to identify, assess, and treat women for substance use disorders with the goal of improving and optimizing outcomes and sustaining recovery.

UTC 46: The Intersection of Substance Use and Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI)

This curriculum is designed to develop provider skills in delivering culturally responsive prevention and treatment services for LGBTQ populations. This training will provide participants with an overview and understanding of the considerations that health providers should take into account to provide inclusive services aimed at people with diverse Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) with a particular focus on the treatment of disorders due to the use of substances.

Rural-based Prevention and Treatment Curriculum for Substance Use Disorders (Rural)

This specialty training series aims to reduce the significant health, social, and economic problems associated with the substance use by professionalizing prevention and treatment workforce,and promoting community participation to develop sustainable community-based prevention, outreach and treatment services in rural and isolated areas throughout the world.

UTC 81: The Alternatives To Incarceration (ATI)

The Alternatives To Incarceration (ATI) training and technical assistance program was developed in order to stimulate systems change through the use of treatment in the rehabilitation of individuals with substance use disorders whose criminal activity is related to that disorder. The overall goal is to train national policy makers to employ alternatives to incarceration across the criminal justice system for individuals identified with substance use disorders.