ArticleDrug and alcohol dependence2020
Impact of 12 step mutual help groups on drug use disorder patients across six clinical trials.
Article in Drug and alcohol dependence, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed.
- Adults with problematic opioid use released from jail: Mutual help groups and medication support contribute to a greater likelihood of opioid abstinence.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2026Article
- Mapping and measuring addiction recovery: Recommended protocols through the PHENX toolkit.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2026Review
- Effectiveness of Mutual Help Groups for Illicit Drug Use Disorders: A Review of the Current Literature.Current addiction reports · 2025Article
- Levels and outcomes of 12-step participation among sexual and gender minority subgroups.Journal of substance use and addiction treatment · 2024Article
- A systematic qualitative study investigating why individuals attend, and what they like, dislike, and find most helpful about, smart recovery, alcoholics anonymous, both, or neither.Journal of substance use and addiction treatment · 2024Article
- Prevalence and correlates of 12-step and second-wave mutual-help attendance in a nationally representative US sample.Alcohol, clinical & experimental research · 2024Article
- Piloting the integration of SMART Recovery into outpatient alcohol and other drug treatment programs.Addiction science & clinical practice · 2023Article
- Demonstration of an app-delivered digital therapeutic program for methamphetamine use disorder.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Article
- Article
- The role of patient volunteers in Fangcang Shelter Hospital during the Omicron wave of COVID-19 pandemic in Shanghai, China: a qualitative study.Frontiers in public health · 2023Article
- Substance use and criminogenic thinking: Longitudinal latent class analysis of veterans with criminal histories.Journal of substance abuse treatment · 2022Article
- Time-lagged association between counseling and/or 12-Step attendance with subsequent opioid use in a secondary analysis from a randomized, clinical trial of medications for opioid use disorder.Drug and alcohol dependence reports · 2022Article
- Effects of Substance Use, Recovery, and Non-Drug-Related Online Community Participation on the Risk of a Use Episode During Remission From Opioid Use Disorder: Longitudinal Observational Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2022Observational
- Understanding recovery Capital in relation to categorical 12-Step involvement and abstinence social support.Addiction research & theory · 2022Article
- College programming for students in addiction recovery: A PRISMA-guided scoping review.Addictive behaviors · 2021Article
- Reasons to be cheerful: Personal, civic, and economic achievements after resolving an alcohol or drug problem in the United States population.Psychology of addictive behaviors : journal of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors · 2021Article
- Online recovery support meetings can help mitigate the public health consequences of COVID-19 for individuals with substance use disorder.Addictive behaviors · 2021Article
- Substance Use Treatment Utilization Among Individuals With Substance Use Disorders in the United States During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Findings on the Role of Polysubstance Use, Criminal Justice Involvement, and Mental Illness From the National Survey on Drug Use and Health.Substance use : research and treatmentArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
10 authors.
Funding
Abstract
background12 step mutual help groups are widely accessed by people with drug use disorder but infrequently subjected to rigorous evaluation. Pooling randomized trials containing a condition in which mutual help group attendance is actively facilitated presents an opportunity to assess the effectiveness of 12 step groups in large, diverse samples of drug use disorder patients.
methodsData from six federally-funded randomized trials were pooled (n = 1730) and subjected to two-stage instrumental variables modelling, and, fixed and random effects regression models. All trials included a 12 step group facilitation condition and employed the Addiction Severity Index as a core measure.
resultsThe ability of 12 step facilitation to increase mutual help group participation among drug use disorder patients was minimal, limiting ability to employ two-stage instrumental variable models that correct for selection bias. However, traditional fixed and random effect regression models found that greater 12 step mutual help group attendance by drug use disorder patients predicted reduced use of and problems with illicit drugs and also with alcohol.
conclusionFacilitating significant and lasting involvement in 12 step groups may be more challenging for drug use disorder patients than for alcohol use disorder patients, which has important implications for clinical work and for effectiveness evaluations. Though selection bias could explain part of the results of traditional regression models, the finding that participation in 12 step mutual help groups predicts lower illicit drug and alcohol use and problems in a large, diverse, sample of drug use disorder patients is encouraging.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.