New website a gateway to recovery
A new online referral service for The Bridge Program is expected to increase demand for The Salvation Army’s award-winning drug and alcohol treatment programs.
The Salvation Army’s Recovery Services has launched its new website: salvos.org.au/recovery which aims to increase awareness about The Bridge Program, provide world class information for students and researchers and give health professionals and potential clients the ability to make a referral online.
“If a person was to go to court for example, a solicitor could make this referral prior to the person going to court or the court chaplain could make that referral,” explains Territorial Mission and Resource Director – Recovery, Major David Pullen. “Or when a police officer apprehends someone and the person is saying, ‘I want to get help,’ they’re able to make a referral directly there or refer the person to this webpage.”
The website also allows Recovery Services to share resources with its centres and chaplains and to make available to students and other industry members the rich history of research that has been undertaken on The Bridge Program and its outcomes over the past decade.
Lat year The Salvation Army gained national recognition for its Bridge Program when it won a prestigious National Drug and Alcohol Award for Excellence in Research. It shared the award with its research partner, Illawarra Institute for Mental Health, University of Wollongong.
“We’re using internationally validated measures to quantify our outcomes and then these are compared against other research studies in Australia and overseas that have used similar measures,” Recovery Services Clinical Director, Gerard Byrne said at the time. “What we’re finding is the Bridge Program is showing up in comparative studies as being leading practice.”
The new website is in its early stages of development and there are plans to add a lot more information and resources, and even an interactive section for graduating Bridge Program members so that they can keep in touch with each other and help each other stay on track through supportive forums.
“My vision for the future of this website is to make it … as holistic in its nature as possible,” says Major Pullen.
To access the new Recovery Services website, go to salvos.org.au/recovery
Comments
No comments yet - be the first.