As someone who has gone through his own struggles with addiction recovery, Garrick Wann knows just how meaningful it is to spend time with someone who understands the process.
“Nothing hits home more than somebody arriving at their door to provide services and … simply looking over and being like, ‘I get it. I’ve been there,’ ” Wann said.
Wann, who grew up in East Greenwich, says he began experimenting with drugs when he was 12 and soon the search for a high took over his life. As he spent years in and out of treatment, Wann says, he lacked guidance on how to transition into a life of sobriety while still surrounded by the same triggers that fueled his drug use.
“I was essentially left to navigate that on my own,” Wann said.
Now Wann helps others in recovery, working at addiction treatment company Aware Recovery Care of Rhode Island LLC. It’s the only agency licensed in Rhode Island to offer in-home treatment, according to Linda Mahoney, program administrator of behavioral health and substance use conditions for the R.I. Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals.
That in-home model allows clients to receive treatment with less disruption to family and work life that inpatient treatment may cause. Also, there’s no need for open beds, which are in demand at treatment facilities in Rhode Island right now, says Sarah Doyle, agency director of Aware Recovery in Rhode Island and Connecticut.
“Recovery is incredibly hard,” Doyle said. “Aware is never full. [Because of in-home treatment] there’s no limit on beds we have … and we don’t run out of support.”
So far, Connecticut-based Aware has launched its services in 11 states, and it is still rapidly growing as the need for addiction recovery services has increased, Doyle says.
Wann started as a client recovery adviser, or CRA, for Aware when the company launched in North Kingstown in 2021. In this role, he was able to lean on his experience to guide others recovering from substance use addiction and was a crucial part of Aware’s in-home addiction treatment model.
Specifically, Wann would regularly visit clients wherever they were – whether it was at their home, the gym, a walk in the park or even exploring peer recovery groups – to help them form habits and skills to sustain long-term recovery.
Not all of Aware’s CRAs have experienced substance addiction, but the vast majority have, and this allows them to better relate to clients.
“The level of connection that happens between a client and someone who’s been in their shoes before is insurmountable,” Wann said.
The personal guidance is then coupled with clinical resources as Aware clients are assigned their own treatment team that includes two CRAs, a licensed care coordinator, a nurse practitioner, a psychotherapist and other professionals.
The program lasts 52 weeks, but clients don’t need to commit to the full year of treatment, and services are covered through several insurers nationwide, including Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island. Each week throughout the program, clients meet with at least two people from their team and along with helping clients, Aware also has support available for family members and loved ones, Sarah Doyle says.
While there is certainly value in traditional inpatient treatments, they may not work for everyone, Doyle says. For example, Doyle says they can be costly, both financially and emotionally, as clients are pulled away from their jobs and loved ones.
Mahoney says the state is supportive of in-home treatment programs as health officials have sought to make health care more accessible. In recent years, there has been an increase in services such as telehealth and mobile outreach clinics that help those with substance use or other mental or behavioral health issues.
“We have to meet people where they are,” Mahoney said.
In Rhode Island, addiction is clearly a big problem. The number of accidental drug overdoses has remained at “crisis levels” with 435 deaths reported in 2021 and 434 deaths in 2022 – one of the highest rates per capita in the country, according to R.I. Department of Health data.
So far, Aware’s approach to treatment appears to be effective.
Since launching in Rhode Island in August 2021, Aware has served at least 350 clients, Doyle says. Also, 78% of Aware clients across 11 states surveyed between 2017-2019 reported they remained abstinent from drugs and alcohol and 95% reported improved relationships with family members six months after treatment. Further, according to Aware’s internal data through the fourth quarter of 2022, 59% of clients remained in treatment after 24 weeks, as compared with the industry average of 25%-30%.
Now as Wann is approaching five years of recovery himself, he says he found a renewed sense of purpose through helping others with Aware.
After working as a CRA for nine months, Wann became a CRA manager, a position in which he meets with fewer clients directly and is more focused on coaching and supporting other recovery advisers.
“The thing that I love about the role the most is the focusing on the development piece,” Wann said. “If I’m taking the additional effort to spend time with CRAs and coach them and guide them to be better at what they do, then that translates down to the client and I still feel that connection.”
