Reliance Center™ welcomes transfer patients from other Bay Area buprenorphine medical practices as well as those patients relocating to the Bay Area from out-of-state or elsewhere in California. Patients should contact us to arrange an interview with one of our Medical Directors and our Director of Clinical Services to discuss the appropriate level of care. Patients may also arrange to participate in all of our counseling and ancillary service programs while continuing to receive their medication from another medical practice. In these cases, we require a  release from the patient, so that our staff can communicate freely with the medication prescribing practice, and patient care can be coordinated in an effective manner.

Experience has shown that individuals in early recovery are not always willing, or able, for that matter, to reach out to others to let their feelings be known, ask a question, or seek advice on an important matter. Reliance Center™ Outreach Services has been developed to meet this need. Each week, for as long as patients are in our care, our staff will reach out to patient by phone and text simply to see how their treatment is progressing. The patient can use this setting to discuss problems, provide comments about programs at the facility, or simply allow us to acknowledge that they are part of our recovery community. The daily wellbeing of our patient is our primary concern. When patients are given the opportunity to feel they are part of something larger than themselves, it can be very comforting. We want our patients and their families to know that we are ready and willing to play an active role in their lives, and place our considerable resources at their disposal.

Reliance Center™ adheres to a system of routine comprehensive drug testing. We do this as a way of supporting our patient’s progress, not as a method of confronting inappropriate behavior. First and foremost we want our patients to know that patients will never be discharged on the basis of positive drug screens. To the contrary, we see this result as the basis of increasing our commitment to the patient and for the patient to increase their own commitment to their personal recovery program. Building a program of abstinence from non-medical opiate abuse takes persistence, resilience, and the recognition that as a potential multiple relapsing condition, bumps in the road may occur, and when they do, they should not be seen as some form of moral failure or weakness. It is simply the nature of the illness. This is a very important principle that we want our patients to understand.

For example, if a person were to suffer from chronic diabetes, and for a period of time, say six months, they were able to completely avoid cake and candy, take their insulin and manage their disease effectively, they would be considered a “compliant” patient; one that recognizes the potential consequences of their disease and acts accordingly. As a result, they are able to lead a relatively normal live. Then one day, for no apparent reason, the person goes out and eats a huge piece of chocolate cake, goes into diabetic shock, and lands in the emergency room. No one accuses the patient of a “moral slip”, or calls them a failure. The medical staff simply stabilizes their blood sugar and tells them to be more careful in the future. This is the way we want our patients to see their illness, and the way it’s seen at Reliance Center™: a chronic, potentially multiple relapsing disorder that can be treated and largely arrested with appropriate intervention and continuing care. However, individuals can have an unexpected flair up, not necessarily for any apparent reason. When this happens the patient needs to regain their recovery footing, recommit themselves to their program, and recognize the chronic nature of the disease of addiction. It can be effectively arrested. It is rarely considered “cured”.    

Reliance Center™ offers a variety of ancillary services to our patients as a means of supporting their efforts at building healthy lifestyles, as well as availing themselves of services which may also prove beneficial in their recovery. While we do not present these serrvices as evidence -based treatments, we do provide information offering some insight into the healing nature of this work.

 

We offer our patients exceptional practitioners in the areas of  chiropractic care, acupuncture and shiatsu massage.  Please  review the Science Sidebar for a more in-depth presentation. Here are the websites of our two primary ancillary care providers.

Acupuncture and Shiatsu Massage:

http://www.onwellnessclinic.com/

 

Chiropractic Care:

http://www.susanbrennan.com/

Reliance Center™ understands that the willingness to take the difficult personal step of committing to treatment is not something that falls neatly within the bounds of pre-determined admission days and hours. Additionally, this willingness does not always remain constant, and we do not want any opportunity to be lost. Once lost, it can’t always be regained.

While published admission times are provided to inquiring patients and families to help them make plans and accommodate employment requirements, Reliance Center™ is committed to providing Treatment on Demand in every way possible.

When a patient indicates that they wish to enter our care, our admissions staff immediately begins the process of setting up a pre-admission appointment and assembling the required medical and clinical resources. If the request is made during normal business hours, every effort is made to provide an admission screening that same day. If the required staff is no longer on-site and can not be reassembled, admission will be provided on the following day. All inquiries received on Saturday and Sunday will be accommodated on Monday. 

There are occasions where a drug abuse pattern has become quite acute, but the using individual can not or will not see the level of difficulty that has developed around their addiction. Often in these situations the family has sought initial guidance by  contacting a center such as ours. As a result, the severity of the situation has been confirmed.

Often a therapist or counselor already involved with the individual or family has indicated some form of treatment commitment is clinically indicated. The addict is resistant. Usually engulfed in fear as to what the future holds, even with growing consequences, they are frozen in inaction. In these circumstances contacting and engaging a professional interventionist may be the family’s best course of action. These professionals have been trained to work with families and resistant addicts to address reluctance on the part of the addict, and allow the family to gain more distance from the immediate emotional distress caused by the addictive behavior. 

Reliance Center™ maintains professional relationships with a number of these interventionists  here in the San Francisco Bay Area and nationally, and can work with families or psychotherapists to move the situation in a positive direction.  We need not necessarily be the treatment venue of choice.

We consider assisting families in this regard to part of our professional commitment. As to treatment options, we want the patient to secure the most appropriates treatment venue, regardless of whether we provide the care or it is provided by another treatment center.  

Tapering is the process of discontinuing medication-assisted therapy over a period of time. At Reliance Center™, this is most often accomplished by reducing, in measured degrees, the patient’s dose of Suboxone. The actual time required for this process varies depending on a number of considerations, including the size of the current dose, the length of time the patient has been in treatment, and the clinical assessment concerning the potential of the patient returning to opiate use in the short or long term.

We want our patients to do well and thrive, and we also understand the patient’s desire to be “drug free”. The clinical staff must always be guided by medical considerations of gain versus risk, but we will never take away the patient’s right to make their own decisions.