While researching the acceptability of the SACS, the young people who participated reported (unprompted) that completing the SACS gave them an opportunity to reflect on and consider their own (drug-taking) behaviour.
What the young people reported is part of a brief intervention. Brief interventions involve gathering information about a person's substance use, giving them the opportunity to reflect on their behaviour and providing them with feedback and advice about changing. Potential outcomes from a brief intervention include increasing a young person's awareness of risks, a change in behaviour leading to harm reduction or successfully engaging a young person into longer-term treatment.
These manuals are guides to performing a brief intervention utilising the SACS. The complete version is a fairly detailed introduction to the principles of AOD treatment (and the SACS Brief Intervention) for clinicians with limited AOD experience. The abridged manual concentrates mainly on the SACSBI and is intended for clinicians with previous experience and training in AOD assessment and treatment.
With increasing familiarity and success with basic AOD treatment, hopefully clinicians will gain in confidence, develop their skills and eventually provide more (and better) AOD interventions across a range of services.
Disclaimer - The Substances and Choices Scale (SACS) is available for use by researchers and not-for-profit health agencies that provide services to enhance the health and well-being of young people. It has been designed to be only used by health professionals who have an active and ongoing relationship with the recipient of the questionnaire. This is so that issues around confidentiality can be discussed, and so that appropriate mental health support can be accessed if required. ALAC and those involved in developing the SACS do not accept any responsibility or liability for any direct or indirect loss, problems or consequences of any kind arising from the use or misuse of the SACS.
Copyright - The different versions of the Substances and Choices Scale and its associated documents are copyrighted documents. The SACS may be used without charge by non-profit organizations as long as clients are not charged for its use. Electronic reproductions of the SACS are permitted if the content remains identical and formatting is similar to the paper version. Please note however that the SACS is validated as a pen and paper questionnaire only.