Welcome

The Coalition for Women’s Treatment originated through St Monica’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service in 1999. This project is a statewide infrastructure of women’s treatment programs dedicated to promote awareness of and advocate for gender-specific treatment for women with substance use and/or mental health disorders.

Substance use disorder is a complicated disease that presents a unique threat to women’s health and lives. Unfortunately, there is a lack of understanding about the different ways in which women exhibit symptoms of substance misuse, the risk factors and reasons why women become addicted, what makes it difficult for them to stop or seek help, and how programs need to be tailored to meet the needs of women in treatment.

Some of the Coalition activities include educating the public and professionals about issues surrounding substance use and mental health for women, offering opportunities for women’s treatment programs to network, collaborate and support the efforts of improving treatment for women and collaborating with other agencies to address additional issues in women’s lives such as interpersonel violence.