Shortage Of Addiction Counselors Further Strained By

As the drug-related death toll rises in the United States, communities are trying to open more treatment beds. But an ongoing labor shortage among drug treatment staff is slowing those efforts.

Each year, roughly one of every four substance-abuse clinicians nationally chooses toleave the job, according to recent research. And that's not just turnover — leaving one job for another in the same field. As an Institute of Medicine report documented in 2006, there's been a shortage of addiction workers for decades. And the demand is only increasing; the Affordable Care Act and other federal laws have given millions more people insurance to help them pay for those services. If only there were enough counselors to treat them.

Amelie Gooding runs Phoenix House in Keene, New Hampshire, and says she's been short a full-time counselor for a year and half.

"Everybody thinks, 'Oh, there aren't enough beds!' " Gooding says. "But there's not enough treatment staff to open more beds."

Because she's understaffed, Gooding has to leave three of her 18 residential beds empty, and she cut her outpatient groups down to 50 percent capacity.

So where have all the counselors gone?

"For me, it got to be too heavy," says former counselor Melissa Chickering, who used to work for Gooding at the Phoenix House and still lives in the area.

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