Summary
In South Australia in 2009–10, 59 publicly-funded government and non-government alcohol and other drug treatment agencies provided 9,092 treatment episodes. This was anncrease of four treatment agencies but a decrease of 572 treatment episodes from 2008–09. The median1 ages of persons receiving treatment for their own drug use slightly increased (35) and those seeking assistance in relation to someone else’s drug use decreased (41) in 2009–10. Alcohol was again the most common principal drug of concern (56%), followed by amphetamines (11%) and cannabis (10%). Counselling was the most common form of main treatment provided in 2009–10 (accounting for 27% of episodes). This was followed by assessment only (26%), withdrawal management (19%) and rehabilitation (11%). In the previous two years assessment only (27% in 2008–09 and 30% in 2007–08) was the most common form of main treatment provided in South Australia.
1 The median is the midpoint of a list of observations ranked from the smallest to the largest.