Relapse enrichment program: An innovative, brief, pragmatic, low-cost, educational intervention for distress-free and shortest relapses in alcohol dependence

The current practice of managing the relapses of alcohol dependence with available options is distressful for patients and their families and leading therapeutic nihilism among treating physicians. There are two current realities about substance addiction: first, relapses are the rule rather than the exception, and second, there is a need for four to six relapses/abstinence attempts for the complete recovery of most patients. Considering these realities, the author proposes an innovative, brief, low-cost, educational intervention called a relapse enrichment program (REP), which can be used routinely in busy clinical practice. The crux of REP is enriching patients and their families about the two realities mentioned above of alcohol dependence to aim for distress-free and shortest possible relapses toward complete recovery from alcohol dependence. This proposed REP needs further extensive research in the Indian context.