Fighting Addiction TogetherWe Do RecoverWhat questions should families ask a treatment center before admission?
You are the one making the calls while someone you love is in crisis. Here are the questions that tell you whether a place is built for recovery or built for admissions.
Ask four things. Whether the treatment is evidence based and matched to the person in front of them, how they plan to keep you involved as the family, what specifically happens the day after discharge, and who you are actually talking to on the phone and how that person gets paid. A program built for recovery will answer all four without getting defensive. A program built for admissions will rush you past them.
If you want, reach out here first and somebody who has been where you are will talk these through with you before you call anywhere.
You are not supposed to know what good looks like
Nobody teaches you how to shop for addiction treatment. You find out you need it on the worst day of your life, usually with a few hours to decide, and almost everything you read when you search is written by the places trying to admit your person. That is not a conspiracy. It is just who has the time and money to publish. It does mean the deck is stacked, so here is what to ask so you are not choosing blind.
1. "Is your treatment evidence based, and how do you match it to the person?"
The National Institute on Drug Abuse tells people to ask five plain questions before choosing a program: is the treatment plan supported by scientific evidence, is it tailored to the individual, does the program reassess and adjust as needs change, how long should treatment last, and how do 12 step groups fit in. NIDA's point is that effective treatment is individualized and research backed, not a fixed package everyone gets handed.
What I listen for in the answer is whether they talk about your person or about their program. A place that jumps straight to selling you amenities has told you something. A place that asks what the person has already tried, what happened, and what they actually want out of this is thinking about recovery. Ask it directly. If they cannot explain why their plan fits your person, it does not fit your person.
2. "How will you keep me involved?"
Addiction is a family illness. You have probably been managing this for years and you know things an intake coordinator never will. A good program treats that as an asset.
Ask how often you will hear from them, who your point of contact is, and whether there is a family program or family therapy at all. I say the family matters just as much as the person using, and I mean it. The places that do this well bring the family in early. The ones that go quiet after admission are often the ones you hear from again only near discharge, when it is time to talk about the next payment.
3. "What happens the day after discharge?"
This is the question almost nobody asks, and it is the one that decides whether any of this works.
NIDA treats continuing care as part of treatment rather than an afterthought, because the risk of relapse is highest right after someone leaves a structured setting. The thing to press on is the plan for that first week home: the follow up appointment, the medication if there is one, the meetings, and who calls to check in.
Detox is the door, not the house. If the whole plan is thirty days inside and then good luck, that is not a plan. Ask them to walk you through the first seven days after discharge in concrete detail. If they can name the appointment, the prescriber, and the person who follows up, good. If the answer gets vague, your person is going to come home to nothing, and that is where it falls apart.
4. "Who am I talking to right now, and how do you get paid?"
When you search for treatment and call a number, a lot of the time you are not calling a treatment center at all. You are calling whoever paid to sit at the top of the results.
The Federal Trade Commission warned in June 2025 that the first search results are often paid ads, and told people not to assume a phone number in search results belongs to the business they were looking for. In one 2025 settlement the FTC said a company ran ads impersonating specific treatment centers and routed the callers into its own call center instead. Back in 2022, in its first case under the Opioid Addiction Recovery Fraud Prevention Act, the FTC said a referral service transferred callers straight into its own network without assessing their needs or even asking whether they wanted residential or outpatient care or a place that took Medicaid. Congress held a hearing on these advertising and marketing practices in the treatment industry in 2018.
I am not telling you everyone on the phone is a scammer. Referral and admissions work is a normal part of this field and plenty of honest people do it. I am telling you to ask the question out loud: are you the treatment center, or are you a service that gets paid to route me somewhere, and if so, who pays you. An honest answer is fine. A dodge is the answer. The only referral I have ever fully trusted is a former client who got sober and sent someone they love.
What to do next
You do not have to figure this out alone or against a clock. Write these four questions down and ask them at every place you call. If you want a person to think it through with you first, with nobody getting paid based on what you decide, reach out and somebody who has been where you are will call you back. Our full list of questions to ask a center goes deeper, and if you are the family member trying to help, start with the page for families.
If your person is using and might use alone, put the Never Use Alone number in their phone now: 800-484-3731, 24 hours a day, staffed by people in recovery, no police.
Sources
NIDA, Seeking Drug Abuse Treatment: Know What to Ask, National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIH): nida.nih.gov
Seeking treatment for addiction? Some things to know as you search, Federal Trade Commission consumer alert, June 10 2025: consumer.ftc.gov
Drug treatment referral service took advantage of addictions to make a quick buck, Federal Trade Commission consumer alert, May 17 2022: consumer.ftc.gov
Examining Advertising and Marketing Practices within the Substance Use Treatment Industry, U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee hearing, July 24 2018: docs.house.gov
SAMHSA National Helpline, free and confidential, 24/7/365, treatment referral and information service, 1-800-662-HELP (4357): samhsa.gov
If any of this is your life right now
Leave your name and a number and somebody who has been through it calls you back, usually within a few minutes. Nothing to sell, nothing to sign.