International best practice indicates that treatment of severe adolescent addiction problems should involve dedicated input by a Multi-Disciplinary Team. The Young Persons Programme at the Drug Treatment Centre Board has been in existence since 2000 where the programme has developed substantially with growth and diversification of the Multi-Disciplinary Team.  The Young Persons Programme deals with the most complex cases of adolescent addiction and has substantial experience and real expertise within this field.

In both Britain and Ireland, there is growing awareness of the need for Child & Adolescent Psychiatrists to become more involved in the provision of addiction treatment to teenagers with substance misuse difficulties. However, most Child & Adolescent Psychiatrists have very little exposure to addiction treatment during their training and many report feeling un-skilled when presented with a complex addiction problem in a teenager. 

In November 2006, The Drug Treatment Centre Board ran a two day conference for Mental Health Professionals with the main learning objective being to equip attendees with the basic skills to conduct assessments of complex adolescent addiction cases and to subsequently develop treatment plans to tackle the problems identified. The Conference involved a combination of lectures, case discussions, small group work and workshops dealing with very specific area of treatment.  Click here to view the conference schedule, speaker papers, additional downloads and workshop notes.