The Czech Republic Annual Report 2010 Drug ... - Drogy-info.cz

Approximately a quarter of the facilities that were interviewed have developed a certain form of rules or guidelines
for work with this target group or its subgroups. They are mostly drop-in centres’ manuals specifying how to work
with pregnant users or deal with children staying at and entering low-threshold facilities.
A total of 37 (42%) of the facilities that were interviewed are planning to pay closer attention to at least one of the
target groups under consideration in the future; pregnant women were mentioned the most frequently in this
respect (38%), followed by drug-dependent parents (33%) and children (29%). The staff members indicated that
their greater focus on these target groups is hampered by their limited human and financial resources, the
inadequate nature of the liaison with the public administration bodies, and sometimes also clients’ lack of interest
in the services, but the majority of the respondents showed interest in further information about the issue in
question.
12.3.3 Standards of Professional Competency of Services
The services intended for the users of addictive substances that receive funding from the state budget are subject to
the system of certification of professional competency of drug services and must comply with the criteria for care set
out in the general and specific standards; see the chapter on Drug-Related Treatment: Treatment Demand and
Treatment Availability (p. 55). The provisions of the general section of the standards include that the patient/client is
entitled to contact with their family and/or significant others, if it does not contravene the conditions and restrictions of
professional care (Standard 2.6: Patients’/clients’ Rights). The specific standards for low-threshold centres and both
outpatient and inpatient treatment facilities require that in cases where it is considered necessary clients should be
referred to examination for pregnancy and other specialised interventions, as needed. The standards provide no
further specifications of client characteristics relevant to the topic of this chapter and make no references to the
distinct features of care for pregnant users and drug-using parents of minors. This may be caused by the fact that, at
the time of the development of the standards, the issue of pregnant drug users and the children of drug users did not
receive adequate attention in the Czech Republic.
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