Assessing Technical Assistance Needs among Recovery Residence Operators in the United States

ABSTRACT

Recovery support services such as recovery housing assist individuals with increasing their access to social support, employment services, and systems of care. Lack of evidence-based practices and calls for increased oversight of these settings suggests a growing need for technical assistance and training for recovery residence owners and staff, yet little is known about their areas of greatest need for technical assistance. We developed and administered a survey to assess the technical assistance needs of recovery housing operators in the United States using a convenience sample of individuals who own or operate a recovery residence (N = 376). A total of 77 owners/operators completed the survey (20% response rate), representing urban, suburban, and rural communities. Differences were observed between number of owned residences: owners/operators of a single residence were interested in technical assistance on house-specific policies and linkage to established systems of care, whereas owners/operators of multiple residences were interested in technical assistance on building financial sustainability and incorporation of best practices into their recovery residences. As an increasing number of states move to implement voluntary certification or licensing for recovery residences, targeted training and technical assistance to owners/operators will facilitate the successful adoption of recovery residence best practices and quality standards.

KEYWORDS:

• Substance use disorder
• recovery housing
• technical assistance
• best practices
• quality standards
• systems of care

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Sarah Eustice, Adam Trosper, Michelle Kilgore, and Jay Bell for their contributions to survey development, recruitment, and study design.

Disclosure statement

Dave Sheridan is the Executive Director of the National Alliance for Recovery Residences (NARR), and Jennifer Miles is on the Board of Directors for the NARR. All other authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Data availability statement

The dataset used and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Additional information

Funding

Work on this manuscript was supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) 6 UD9RH336310105. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of HRSA. The funding agency had no role in study design, data collection, analysis, or interpretation of the findings, or in the writing of the manuscript. Research reported in this publication was supported by the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), a component of the National Institute of Health (NIH) under award number TL1TR003019. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.