title: Delivering more effective treatment to adolescents: Improving the juvenile drug court model.
abstract: Juvenile drug courts (JDC) emerged in response to a perceived need to intervene more effectively in the substance abuse-delinquency cycle. The influx of drug and alcohol offenders, lack of other juvenile justice system interventions, and positive experiences with adult drug courts helped drive interest in adapting the drug court model for juveniles. This article: (1) provides an overview of substance use and the juvenile justice system; (2) describes the current status of JDC programs; and (3) proposes a model for planning, implementing and evaluating JDCs based on adolescent drug use and treatment research as well as current JDC models. The lack of science-based JDC models and empirically sound JDC evaluations has limited the effectiveness of JDCs. The proposed model is designed to create a new generation of JDCs that maximizes the effectiveness of local resources and delivers research-based interventions to youth and families impacted by substance abuse and delinquency.
authors.affiliation: The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, 633 Third Avenue, 10017-6706, New York, NY, USA. blenko@tresearch.org
authors.forename: Steven
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Belenko
authors.forename: T K
authors.initials: TK
authors.lastname: Logan
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000437:Alcoholism / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D015897:Comorbidity; D003416:Criminal Law; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D006302:Health Services Research / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D006801:Humans; D007604:Juvenile Delinquency / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000534:rehabilitation / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D055502:Secondary Prevention; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014481:United States