Leila Jamshidi - Specialist in Community Medicine, Department of Mental Health, Social Health and Addiction, Ministry of Health, Tehran, Iran
Alireza Noroozi - Psychiatrist, Iranian National Center for Addiction Studies, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran,Iran
Saeedeh Mostafavi - Clinical Psychologist, South Tehran Health Center,Clinical psychologist, South Tehran Health Center, Tehran, Iran

Background and Aim : Dysfunctional parenting style is one of the most important risk factors in adolescent’s substance use, especially in family which have an addicted parent. The aim of this study is to evaluate a selective parenting program among parents with opioids use disorder (OUD) stabilized on methadone maintenance treatment (MMT) and their spouses who are parent and or guardians of adolescents aged 12 to 18 years old. The parenting program consisted of 8 weekly group sessions facilitated by a trained clinical psychologist targeting family cohesion, communication, involvement, and supervision.Methods : The study comprises a multi-center randomized trial with control group that was conducted in15 public-owned MMT programs in five universities of medical sciences in Iran. Inclusion criteria were (a) receiving MMT, and abstinence of illicit drug use for minimum of 3-months, or being spouse of someone receiving MMT who is abstinent for at least 3-months; (b) guardianship of an adolescent aged 12-18;(c) providing voluntary, informed written consent and (d) ability to read and write. Exclusion criterionwas not participating in other parenting programs concurrently. Eligible participants (n=710) were assigned to experimental (n=402) and control (n=308) groups,randomly. The subjects were assessed by Depression, Anxiety, Stress Scale (DASS), Stress Index for Parents of Adolescents (SIPA), Index of Marital Satisfied (IMS) and Parenting Scale (PS) at baseline, completion of intervention and 3 month follow up phase. Data were analyzed by parametric test, ANOVA, Paired T test, T testand Chi-squared. Results : Completion of parenting program defined as maximum 1 session of absence was 87%. Participants in experimental and control groups were comparable in terms of demographic characteristics, and study measures at baseline.Scores in post-test showed that the intervention program have had significant effects on sub scales of DASS, SIPA, IMS and PS tests compare with pretest and the mean score in experimental group decreased significantly compare with control group. Durability of the effectiveness was shown in all of scales except PS test by the 3 month follow up.Conclusion : The parenting training for parents with OUD stabilized on MMT is an effective intervention to reduce family level risk factors for initiation of substance use among adolescents and improve adolescents-parent relationships in families. Further studies to measure long-term outcomes of the intervention are needed.

parenting education, substance use disorders, primary prevention, adolescent