This new consumer guide offers people with past or current problematic substance use a straightforward exploration of the roles, values, and work environments of professional peer specialists. This guide is a comprehensive resource that will help readers understand who professional peer specialists are, what they do in various work settings, and how to access and pay for their services. Through visual aids illustrating the integration of peer specialists into the treatment and recovery landscape and practical forms readers can fill out, this consumer guide will help facilitate a strong start toward collaboration with a peer specialist.

This brief report presents self-reports of recovery among adults aged 18 and older in the United States who thought they ever had a problem with their use of drugs or alcohol and/or mental health. These findings provide a clearer characterization of the factors associated with recovery among adults and how future efforts can foster a whole-health approach to sustain recovery from mental health and substance use conditions.

This practical guide reviews the principles of Assertive Community Treatment (ACT), presents key considerations for adapting ACT across various treatment settings, populations, and related domain areas, and provides practical guidance for navigating cross-cutting issues.

This document updates SAMHSA’s 2018 document and outlines best practices for the implementation and operation of recovery housing. These best practices are intended to serve as a tool for states, governing bodies, providers, recovery house operators, and other interested stakeholders to improve the health of their citizens, reduce incidence of overdose, and promote recovery housing as a key support strategy in achieving and sustaining recovery.

This model standards guidance document, SAMHSA's National Model Standards for Peer Support Certification, is prepared in response to President Biden's 2022 Unity Agenda. This document outlines model standards for substance use disorder, mental health, and family/youth peer support certification.

Community engagement is often cited as a tool to improve the health of the community and its members. This guide will review evidence related to leveraging community engagement to support the implementation and scale-up of evidence-based programs and policies.

The National Guidelines for Child and Youth Behavioral Health Crisis Care offers best practices, implementation strategies, and practical guidance for the design and development of services that meet the needs of children, youth, and their families experiencing a behavioral health crisis. Additional technical guidance is provided in a companion report produced by SAMHSA in conjunction with the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors, A Safe Place to Be: Crisis Stabilization Services and Other Supports for Children and Youth.

Alcohol misuse is focused on binge and heavy drinking patterns within a community or at the population level. This guide will serve as a compendium of key policies for the prevention of alcohol misuse that have been identified as evidence-based by robust scientific literature.

The book is composed of SAMHSA’s “National Guidelines for Behavioral Health Crisis Care: Best Practice Toolkit” and related papers on crisis services. The toolkit reflects relevant clinical and health services research, review of top national program practices and replicable approaches that support best practice implementation. The related papers address key issues relevant to crisis services, homelessness, technology advances, substance use, legal issues impacting crisis services, financing crisis care, diverse populations, children and adolescents, rural and frontier areas, and the role of law enforcement.

This guide reviews interventions for people living with substance use and mental disorders who are at risk for or living with HIV. Selected interventions are in alignment with goals of the federal “Ending the HIV Epidemic: A Plan for America” (EHE) initiative.