“New Choices” for substance‐using mothers and their children: Preliminary evaluation

Abstract

Setting, participants, intervention and measurement: New Choices is a centralized “one‐stop shop” in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, that provides multiple services in a supportive environment for substance‐using women and their young children. Measures of substance use, social support, mental health, nutrition, parenting and child development were administered to 13 women (21–36 years old) and their 13 children (0–5 years old) when they entered the programme, and at 3 and 6 months thereafter.

Findings: Results revealed a significant improvement in maternal empathy at 3 months and children's social competence at 6 months, and a decrease in maternal support of children's power and independence that was significant at 3 months but not at 6 months. Improvements in other outcomes were not statistically significant, but effect sizes were promising. Results showed more improvements after 6 than 3 months, suggesting that length of programme involvement may be an important factor in outcome.

Conclusions: The findings from this small pilot study suggest that a “one‐stop” intervention for substance‐using mothers and their children might have a positive impact on many outcomes. This evaluation involved a small cohort sample, no comparison group and parent‐report measures only, so it should be viewed as exploratory and interpretation of findings made cautiously.

• Treatment
• mothers
• substance use

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the Hamilton Community Foundation for funding the study, the New Choices Evaluation Committee (especially Dr John McLennan and Michelle Van Tuyl), research assistants Aimei Fan and K. C. Scott, two anonymous reviewers, Dr Louis Schmidt, and the collaborating agencies, staff members, and clients of New Choices. The Ontario Ministry of Health and Long‐term Care also provided financial support for the preparation of this manuscript. The results and conclusions are those of the authors, and no official endorsement by the Ministry is intended or should be inferred.