Grievance Report

Is Your Program Punitive?
Fill Out a Grievance Report -- It's Time To Educate Them!

Does Your Program Treat Patients With Dignity?
Fill Out a Compliment Report.

It's Time to Let Them Know That They are Appreciated!

Get your Grievance Report Form HERE!

The Grievance Report Project is an ongoing project that will be used to educate the methadone community about quality treatment. Programs can no longer hide behind a veil of patient confidentiality or call degrading policies quality treatment. The new accreditation organizations will be interested in these reports.

The Dole-Nyswander Program worked because it was a caring program with a sense of community and that is what needs to be brought back to methadone treatment. NAMA will use the Grievance Report Process to report programs to various agencies for further investigation. This project will not work unless patients themselves tell us about their program. So NAMA needs you to participate.

Grievance Reports are Not Only for Programs!

A Grievance Report can be filed on any agency, institution or program that does not treat you with common dignity and respect. Here are some examples of Grievance Reports that you can file.

There are two kinds of reports: a General Report and an Incident Report.

General Report

A General Grievance Report details the situation at a program, service or agency. A General Report does not require investigation or follow up. You are simply reporting the policy or a particular policy at a program, service or agency. In some instances these policies are discriminatory towards patients. When a policy violates the constitution or law NAMA will notify any oversight agencies or institutions and begin procedures to end the policy. An example of this kind of General Report would be a homeless shelter that does not allow methadone patients. This is a direct violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Every patient should make a General Report about their program, especially during the accreditation transition period (5/17/2001 - 5/17/2004) when programs are re-thinking policy. During this period NAMA is being particularily watchful of programs. When NAMA has collected several General Grievance Reports about a program an inquiry will be made to confirm the policy or if it has been revised or changed. The program's reply will be shared with the patients that have made the reports and if necessary their will be further investigation. This type of report helps to change policy at your program because it makes program staff re-think policy that may not be doing what was originally intended.

Incident Report

If you are having trouble with your program you can report a specific incident. Incident Reports are for specific problems that you are having with your program right now. Other examples of an Incident Grievance Report include take home medication schedule or dose change, either increase or decrease. Usually patients are having trouble because they do not know program policy, state or federal regulations, or resources that they can use to make the program work for them. NAMA believes in empowering patients with information that will help them achieve the goals they have set for themselves. By filing an Incident Report you will be assisted in: (1) knowing the regulations that apply, and (2) how to use regulations and "resources" to get a positive result.

Some Incident Grievance Reports are being filed at a critical point. An example of this is the patient that is being disharged from their program. If this is the case after filing the Incident Grievance Report send an email to Tony Scro, the Grievance Coordinator. The sooner that Tony Scro starts to intervene with a critical issue the more likely your chance at having a positive result.

CONFIDENTIALITY POLICY

All information that is provided will be held strictly confidential in the same manner as the patient protections described in the U.S. Federal Confidentiality Regulations 42 CFR and the Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information (the Privacy Rule) as established by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPPA). In order to assist you at the maximum level of follow-up and outcome, we do request certain personal information. However, if you do not want us to disclose your name for any reason, we will honor your wishes.

We offer three ways to obtain and/or file a Grievance Report:

1. You can copy or print out a Grievance Report and Authorization to Release Information from our website.
   Click Here to go there.
   
   
2. You can download a Grievance Report and Authorization to Release Information in pdf format.
   Click below to download:
   Grievance Report and Release 
   Grievance Report 
   Medical Release 
   
   

Grievance Reports can be sent to:

Erika Lear, CMA, Grievance Coordinator

Or mailed to:

National Alliance of Methadone Advocates
435 Second Avenue
New York, NY 10010

Or faxed to:
(212) 595-nama/6262

Programs and Professionals Need Compliments Too

Lets not do the same thing that programs are at fault of doing -- providing only Negative Feedback to Patients. Programs work on a Negative Reinforcement System which means if you do something wrong you get punished. They would produce more positive outcomes if they worked on a Positive Reinforcement Systems which means Rewarding Patients for Progress. Programs need to know when they are doing the right things too and that is what a Compliment Report is for.

Fill Out a Compliment Report Now!

AND DON'T FORGET TO
JOIN NAMA

Together, we WILL make a difference