SPECIAL NEEDS POPULATIONS

Special populations that Gateway serves include clients who are dually diagnosed with a substance abuse disorder and a mental illness, cognitive impairment or physical/medical disability.

• Gateway began providing therapeutic community treatment services for offenders with special needs at the Estelle unit in Huntsville, Texas in 1994.
• Since then, Gateway has expanded this crucial service, with 890 active special needs beds throughout its facilities, including 358 beds for women in Texas and Missouri and 516 beds for men in Texas through its corrections-based programs. Gateway's community-based program in Chicago treats an additional 220 special needs clients each year.
• The ongoing program is remarkable because despite clients’ additional complications, the treatment completion rate is 90%. 
• An evaluation funded by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT) and conducted by the Change Assessment Research Team of the University of Houston found that Gateway’s program exhibited, “Careful planning of a holistic treatment approach and a comprehensive curriculum,” and owes its success in part to “deliberate and conscientious staff hiring practices to insure the required clinical experience and a successful partnership between security and treatment.”