Addictions and Childhood Sexual Abuse

Study: Most women in drug rehab centers suffered sexual abuse
By Ruth Sinai
Haaretz
March 7, 2007

More than 70 percent of women in drug rehabilitation centers were victims of sexual abuse as children, but only a third receive consistent treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, a recent study found.

A lack of social workers, especially those who specialize in treating PTSD, makes rehabilitating the women very difficult, found Dr. Miriam Schiff of the Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and Social Welfare at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Schiff conducted the study with Shabtai Levitt, who runs methadone clinics in Jerusalem and Ashdod and is a doctoral student in social work.

Schiff and Levitt found that women aged 31-40 are more persistent in undergoing drug rehabilitation through methadone treatment than men of the same age, apparently because the women are motivated by the fear of losing their children. Nonetheless, women comprise only 15 percent of methadone clinic patients, according to the study.

The study also found that some 60 percent of the female patients have been either arrested or detained at some point in their lives