Drug Abuse Curriculum For Employee Assistance Professionals

Identifies the critical issues and information needs of the field and to develop a training program which was responsive to the identified needs. Designed to assist employee assistance program (EAP) professionals in understanding and addressing employee drug abuse problems.

Deteriorating job performance resulting from alcohol and drug dependency requires special handling and specific skills. Developing these skills and learning what to do with them are not difficult tasks. Employee assistance program professionals provide such training for key personnel. Focusing on strategic intervention designed to help employees with personal problems that interfere with job performance, Walter Scanlon describes the functions and benefits of employee assistance programs (EAPs), discusses their training and consultation objectives, and shows how EAPs effectively identify and address such problems. An important EAP goal is to reduce both the incidence of alcohol- and drug-related problems and the costs associated with them. EAPs target employees whose work performance has deteriorated because of chemical dependency or other personal problems. Scanlon has divided his discussion of EAPs into seven workable segments: the concept of EAP; EAP history; the history of drug and alcohol use; current drug and alcohol use in the United States; the legal, corporate, societal, and individual influences on rehabilitation and EAP; governmental influences including the Drug Free Workplace Act and mandatory drug screening; and cost considerations, including the trend toward managed health care.

This landmark text discusses current issues and trends to help employee assistance and human resource professionals do their jobs better and help people live happier, more productive lives by providing them with the resources to deal with personal problems. The current spiraling and escalating rate of change within the business and working world, fueled by other events and phenomena since September 11, 2001, were the impetus and driving force behind the initiative and development of this new fourth edition. This book contains 43 chapters; a total of 21 are from the first two editions, eleven were written specifically for the third edition, and eleven new chapters were exclusively written for this new fourth edition. While savoring the still pertinent, meaningful and relevant-to-today materials from the previous editions, there are nine new updates, written by an all-star team of experts in their respective areas. The topics include history and philosophy, structure and organization, client services and characteristics, program planning and evaluation, professional and paraprofessional training and development, special issues, selected examples and future directions. An excellent textbook for college and university courses and preparation source, this book is a must for professionals wanting to be up-to-date on employee assistance programming, for students in graduate courses and seminars, for college and university courses, and in-service training and continuing education programs.