The state of New York has a very elaborate addiction treatment program. One of the main branches of the addiction treatment program in New York today is the presence of the dual diagnosis treatment approach. This is a method of treating addictions in people who have not one but two conditions that have a bearing on each other. When we speak of dual diagnosis in the context of an addiction, then we are speaking about the addiction to the substance being one of the problems and the other problem being a physical or a psychiatric problem.

The dual diagnosis drug treatment in New York generally deals with psychiatric issues. This is quite apt, because most of the people who are into an addiction have a mental illness also. Centers for dual diagnosis substance abuse treatment in New York are adept at treating people with mental sicknesses such as bipolar disorder, stress and anxiety disorder, eating disorder, schizophrenia, depression, etc.

The way this program works is by introducing the person into a detox treatment first. The detox carried out in a dual diagnosis treatment method is different from the normal detox treatment in New York, because these patients have to undergo a more severe withdrawal process because of their underlying mental condition. For that reason, it can take more days than normal.

Once the withdrawal effects have been completely allayed, the person will be put into psychiatric counseling so that the extent of the mental illness can be gauged and the further part of the treatment program can be planned out.