Integrating Treatment for Tobacco and Other Addictions at the Aurora Centre of the British Columbia Women's Hospital and Health Centre

Abstract

Experience in the women's health field indicates that women often experience addictions in concert with other social and health concerns, making intersections among substance use, mental health and illness, trauma, violence, and HIV/AIDS a key issue. However, both research and practice often overlook these intersections and resulting co-morbidities and tend to address substance use in isolation. In addition, research and practice concerned with alcohol and other drugs rarely address tobacco addiction, so that clinical practice in women's addictions often is not fully informed by an integrated approach. A multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach to both research and practice is necessary in order to address the complex issues involved in women and addiction. While few treatment programs in Canada address cigarette smoking in the context of other addictions, those that do are meeting with some success. The Aurora Centre, a multi-faceted women's substance-use treatment centre based at British Columbia Women's Hospital and Health Centre in Vancouver, does address nicotine addiction in the context of treatment for other addictions. The initiatives taken by the Aurora Centre since 1998 are focused on supporting women's motivations to examine and change their smoking patterns in the context of residential treatment for other drug and alcohol use, and in the aftercare period. Integrating Tobacco into Addictions Treatment Although cigarette smoking poses a serious threat to the health of substance-addicted women, there has been resistance to considering tobacco a "problem drug," along with other substances, in addictions treatment