Back to Life: The Change is Possible

Along with the success and international recognition to the tangible results of Cuban Medicine, the competence, and sensitiveness of the human resources, the Cuban therapies have gained position worldwide, receiving a higher number of patients, from a higher number of countries, seeking for the Island alternatives.

For more than 15 years the program for treating addictions has been developed, supported by the experience of the Cuban school of Psychiatry and Psychology, inserting the best of the Italian, Spanish, Argentinean, Colombian and American schools, respectively.

The scheme is based on the approach known as “therapeutic community” where in group coexistence regime, patients share their feelings, moods, experiences. It is about to find the path again for individual, family, and social responsibilities, through stages, with two main goals: abstinence and change of life style.

 On this scenario, Cuba has the privilege of being a drug circulation-free country, and of operating this treatment, unlike other international versions, without the application of substitute drugs (methadone, naltrexone, LAAM) whose effects do help relieve the symptoms of abstinence, allowing the detoxification of patients, contributing to the endurance of the first stages, but on the long run, creates a counterproductive effect, by creating another dependency, not less harmful.

The Cuba treatment is performed in 4 four stages structured into four areas: therapeutic, educational and occupational alternatives, self-government, and health and tourism.

During the first stage the emphasis is on the individual and group psychotherapy, with the support of techniques like pictography, movie-debates, psychodrama, without underestimating the value of a sustainable work with the family, for the establishment of positive patterns of personal relations, the right approach to the disease, the rehabilitation and the patient's reinsertion in the society.

Acupuncture, relaxation, and physical activity also contribute decisively to the development of new values and a life style change. The educative and cultural alternatives allow measuring the intellectual and working potential of the subject, taking as a base the every day's life behavior and the affected capacities due to the sustained use of toxics. It measures the aptitudes and behavior through work and knowledge, by orienting the patient towards the future labor work.

The self- government is a structural element in the life dynamics of the therapeutic community, through which a group of patients acquire key responsibilities, and along with the staff, they participate in the decision-making process and the internal control.

Finally, the area of health and tourism suggest an up close look to the national cultural and natural attributes of the surroundings (museums, theaters, movies and parks, beach, trekking, etc). They can enjoy them according to the evolution and the self-control capacity acquired in the process of treatment. They are considered a reward given by the collective of the community.

Healing Through Science and Human Warmth.

Further than the strategies, theory approaches and group techniques, the “spell” leans on the Cuban ambiance, the human warmth, the dedication of the professionals who interact on a daily basis with the patient. According to these specialists it is very rewarding to witness the change in patients who have been previously declared a hopeless case in their own countries, and little by little, they confirm how the patients assume and recognize by themselves and for the collective, the true causes of their disease, and progressively they reestablish the rules with honesty and appreciating the functional value of work.

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