The first Oxford House was started in 1975 in Silver Springs MD by a group of recovering alcoholics/addicts who were living in a halfway house that was closing down. Worried that they would have to leave and not have a safe place to go, they decided to rent a house together and hold each other accountable to staying sober. Within six months they had enough money saved to open a second house, to meet the need for more beds. With the help of Federal and State programs this growth has continued and today there are Oxford Houses in almost every state, and in several countries. Each Oxford House is an ordinary single-family house with two bathrooms and four or more bedrooms.

• Despite having known about influenza for almost a century and knowing that pandemic influenza remains one of the greatest threats to human health, we still do not have effective drugs for treating people with severe influenza.
• There appear to be considerable standardization of locations of Oxford Houses as well as what occurs in these settings (Ferrari, Groh & Jason, 2009).
• For many individuals with substance abuse problems, entry into the existing continuum of services begins in a detoxification program.
• It is at these meetings that checks are written for bills and residents are made aware of where they stand financially.
• The National Alliance for Recovery Residences is one of the largest associations of sober living homes in the United States.
• The 2022–2023 influenza season marked the return of influenza virus activity at almost pre-pandemic levels in the EU/EEA countries, highlighting an urgent need for assessment of flu treatments.

No other significant differences were found between the two groups of houses, including sense of community among residents, neighborhood or policy characteristics, and house age. It appears that adequate house income seems to be a necessary factor for houses continuing to function over time. There were only seventeen American Indian participants in our national NIDA study (Kidney, Alvarez, Jason, Ferrari, & Minich, 2009).

Who Lives in Sober Living Homes?

Fifty-three percent of residents reported prior homelessness for an average time of 6 months. Oxford Houses are established in good neighborhoods to integrate the recovering individuals into mainstream communities, away from former environments, people and habits. Behavior change is key for successful recovery and living in a nice house and a nice neighborhood helps restore pride and self-esteem and provides additional incentive for the member to stay clean and sober. Oxford Houses are self-run, self-supported recovery homes for same sexed individuals. These homes are typically found in quiet, nice neighborhoods and offer a drug and alcohol free living environment for those in early recovery.

These different social networks are able to provide support for abstinence to African Americans. Within this large study, we analyzed psychiatric severity data such that we compared residents with high versus low baseline psychiatric severity (Majer, Jason, North, Davis, Olson, Ferrari et al., 2008). No significant differences were found in relation to residents’ number of days in outpatient and residential psychiatric treatment, abstinence rates, and Oxford House residence status. These findings suggest that a high level of psychiatric severity is not an impediment to residing in self-run, self-help settings such as Oxford House among persons with psychiatric co-morbid substance use disorders.

Sample Lease

An important part of why Oxford House has been so successful is that accountability and responsibility are given to the recovering individuals themselves. As a group they behave responsibly and out of that „group responsibility” the individuals develop a new responsible lifestyle free of alcohol and drug use. Substance use treatment providers may offer oversight in some instances, although this is not always the case. The average length of jail time is about one year, with a range of few days to more than ten years.

Results were quite positive; only 18.5% of the participants who left Oxford House during the course of the one-year study reported any substance use (Jason, Davis, Ferrari, & Anderson, 2007). Additionally, over the course of the study, increases were found in the percentage of their social networks who were abstainers or in recovery. Finally, latent growth curve analyses indicated that less support for substance use by significant others and time in Oxford House predicted change in cumulative abstinence over the course of the study. A study published in the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment found sober living home residents experienced improvements in arrest rates, alcohol and drug use rates, and employment rates. The authors found evidence that 12-step program attendance and social support systems were key components of recovery for residents.

Oxford House

There is considerable evidence for the effectiveness of TCs (DeLeon, & Rosenthal, 1989). Substantial reductions in recidivism rates have been found when in-prison Therapeutic Communities (TCs) are combined with community transition programs (Hiller, Knight, & Simpson, 1999; Wexler et al., 1996). what is an oxford house Unfortunately, these TC programs often create a financial burden on society, and are not available to all that need them. Also, therapeutic community residents may stay only for a limited time before many return to former high-risk environments or stressful family situations (Goldsmith, 1992).

• A variety of other studies have also found that sober living homes appear to be an effective component of the recovery process.
• For this reason, the property must be run, on a democratic basis, for the benefit of the House as a group rather than for any individual member.
• Try to determine their optimism, willingness to offer support and motivation for remaining sober.
• Alcoholism and drug addiction are international problems and Oxford Houses can provide recovering individuals the opportunity to become comfortable enough in sobriety to avoid relapse.
• Alcoholism and substance abuse affects over 20 million Americans, and thus is the most prevalent mental disorder facing our nation (Jason, Ferrari, Davis, & Olson, 2006).