Riverbend assists people and their families to rebuild their lives and strengthen our communities by providing the resources, direct support, skills and freedom to live a life of purpose in recovery. Incorporated in 1971,Lowell House Addiction Treatment and Recovery began as a twelve (12) bed residential treatment program in response to the needs of middle-aged, male, recovering alcoholics. It serves as a centerpiece in the drug and alcohol recovery program in the City, a beacon of hope and recovery for nearly 45 years. In 1988, LHATR opened the Sheehan Women’s Program, a forty (40) bed substance abuse treatment program for women on the grounds of the Tewksbury State Hospital. This program, a true “social model” of graduated care, is designed to return women to complete, sober functioning. They can then return to their community as a contributing member, often times reconnecting with their estranged friends and family. The original program was designed to serve women over the age of forty-five with serious impairments. In the 1990’s, younger women were admitted for the first time. Today the program serves women ranging in age from 18 to 80 from all over eastern Massachusetts. LHI began a shift in vision from strictly a residential service agency to a more comprehensive, larger multi-service treatment center for individuals with addictions in the late 1980s. The need for an expansion of the treatment continuum to accommodate recovering individuals in a supportive day setting was critical in the Lowell area. LHATR took the lead in developing and coordinating this weak link in the human service continuum. Services were expanded to include outpatient counseling, driver alcohol education, multiple and second offender aftercare, compulsive gambling counseling, prison counseling, supportive case management, HIV/AIDS support services, treatment for juveniles and a variety of other programs. More recently, a robust Structured Outpatient Addictions Program or SOAP was added to provide a more intense, highly supportive day treatment program for individuals struggling with maintaining sobriety in early recovery. They have also become the lead agency for the Greater Lowell AIDS Consortium adding HIV/AIDs/Hepatitis B prevention and programming including case management, outreach and education, nutritional support, crisis intervention, and street outreach. Relapse, especially in early recovery, is a life-long challenge for individuals struggling with the disease of addictions. Our job is not done once a person completes a prescribed treatment program. Continuums of service for individuals in recovery need to include extended supports in the community to help individuals maintain a lifetime of sobriety. In 2011, LHATR opened its first sober house, Saving Grace, for up to eleven women who have been in recovery for a period of six months or longer. LHATR has a second sober residence, the Hanover House. This beautifully renovated duplex adjacent to the LHATR clinical center will house up to eight men in early recovery for an extended period of time. Both the Hanover House and Saving Grace are viable responses to the prevention of chronic relapse to drug addiction and alcoholism by recovering people who may otherwise fail to maintain sober living on their own. They work closely with the forty-bed Sheehan House program and the Men's Recovery Home in offering a next step in the recovery continuum. During its forty (40) year history, LHATR has diligently maintained its position as a community based, comprehensive addiction treatment agency modifying its course only to accommodate the ever-changing cultural and ethnic composition of its constituency. Our future will focus on ways of stemming the growing epidemic including a 40,000 square foot Recovery Center for the Greater Lowell Community including a new 10,000 square foot clinical and day facility and twenty-three sober living apartments with affordable rents for who need long-term supports. We will continue to add comprehensive mental health services and expand our outreach programs, especially in the Cambodian community. Most of all, we will pay careful attention to addictions and recovery across a lifetime, from the teen years to elder services, and increase our ability to serve and support the families, friends and loved ones of those with the disease of addictions. Often times, they are the forgotten victims and the critical support system individuals need to maintain a clean, sober and productive life. LHATR has decades of experience as a Bureau of Substance Abuse Services (BSAS) licensed facility LHI has been considered best practice in all of its modalities by the Department of Public Health (DPH) and Massachusetts Behavioral Health Partnership (MBHP) for the past several years.
