Substance Abuse Prevention

What is Substance Abuse Prevention?

According to the Federal Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, the role of substance abuse prevention is to create healthy communities that have healthy environments at work and in school, supportive communities and neighborhoods, connections with families and friends, and are drug and crime free. The intention behind substance abuse prevention is to stop substance abuse before it starts, in contrast to substance abuse treatment, which works toward decreasing or stopping use that is already occurring.

NPC Research and Substance Abuse Prevention

NPC Research has worked extensively in substance abuse prevention providing research and evaluation services since its founding in 1990. Beginning in 1990, NPC began administering the yearly Oregon Public Schools Drug Use Survey for the Office of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programs. Since then, NPC has periodically administered the survey as it has evolved into the statewide youth risk and protective factor survey and later into the Oregon Healthy Teen survey to 6th, 8th, and 11th graders. Analyzed data have been used to form prevention programs and substance abuse prevention policies.

In 1996 the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) selected NPC to evaluate the Pacific Northwest Prevention Coalition, which consisted of 18 local ATOD (Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drugs) coalitions in Oregon and Washington. Since then NPC has been involved with the evaluation of many other CSAP and/or National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) related projects including the Oregon State Incentive Cooperative Agreement, the Juvenile Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Diffusion Evaluation and Integrated Data Systems, Safe and Drug Free Schools, and the Oregon State Incentive Grant Enhancement for Early Childhood Prevention projects.

NPC Research enjoys maintaining strong collaborations with numerous substance abuse prevention agencies. The NPC mission is to design research to promote effective decision-making by policymakers at the national, state and community levels. In more than 15 years of experience serving substance abuse prevention agencies and programs, NPC has been fortunate to fulfill that goal, with increasingly enhanced understanding and innovation.