We would like to mention the official start of the project called Support Center for Family Members with Addiction Problems on July 1st of 2013. This project represents the part of broader project (Social Welfare Child Care System Reform – Enhancing Social Inclusion IPA 2010) implemented by the UNDP Office in Montenegro in collaboration with the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare, the Ministry of Education and UNICEF. This project is funded by the EU Delegation to Montenegro. Our project is intended for families with addiction problems, including addicted people themselves as well as any family member suffering from drug abuse consequences.

Our focus through this project is on children whose parents are drug abusers. In this way, we wanted to complete the scope of services offered by our organization, such as: Motivational Interviewing sessions for addicted people and women with children, individual and family psychotherapy, preparation and referral to the long-term stationary treatment, counseling for addicted women HIV-positive and Hepatitis C-positive, counseling for couples with addiction problems, counseling for family members, services of resocialization and reintegration into society, etc.

Based on the success of our previous project called Rebirth Complete (with Police Investigators working in the Centre for Fight Against Drugs and Narcotics and OSCE) we applied and received funds for the implementation of the project Alternative, supported by East-West Management Institute, under its Criminal Justice Civil Society Program (CJCSP), funded by U.S. Department of State/INL.The objective of this project is to train property crime inspectors to enhance their communication skills based on Motivational Interviewing method when they are faced with addicts who have committed a crime. If the inspector, at the time of arrest, take advantage of the moment, and motivate the drug addicted person to recognize and accept the treatment, we believe that this will have a significant impact on reducing the number of problems related to addiction, including the problem of the Justice System who deals with the same offender several times for the same or a similar crime.

In this way we want to introduce the problem of addiction as a problem of the whole society, and through raising the public awareness about the problem of substance abuse and related crimes we intend to influence with multidisciplinary approach.

We also launched the service of based-on-experience and professional counseling, individual and group sessions for drug/alcohol addicted, as well as support services for family members, including co-dependent persons.

In addition to all the above, we want to highlight the existence of the toll-free phone line (for all the fixed and mobile phones in Montenegro). For the previous year, we assisted over 100 people, who called us. We noticed the greater representation of women, which was not previously the case, so we believe that it brought the progress of our work and services in this field.

Preporod

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