Mission

The University of Miami Center for Treatment Research on Adolescent Drug Abuse (CTRADA) was established to conduct psychosocial treatment research on adolescent drug abuse (ADA), from treatment development to mechanisms, evaluation and dissemination. CTRADA is funded by a number of research grants from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) , the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment, and the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention.

The Mission of CTRADA is to:

1. Create a scientific climate of discovery and rigor that will facilitate the expansion of knowledge in ADA treatment through basic and applied studies,
2. Improve family oriented treatments for drug abusing adolescents,
3. Test the efficacy and effectiveness of family oriented as well as existing treatments for drug abusing adolescents
4. Develop a greater understanding of treatment factors, and patient and family characteristics that increase or decrease the likelihood of treatment success,
5. Create the opportunity for synergism among treatment studies and researchers targeting a broad range of ADA populations: dually diagnosed, ethnically diverse, gender specific.
6. Disseminate information on successful treatment models to the local and national drug abuse community,
7. Serve as a national resource to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) for matters related to the treatment of ADA, and
8. Promote translation of findings from basic to applied research to practice and policy.

The fundamental orientation of CTRADA’s investigators is the development and refinement of family-oriented treatments for drug abusing adolescents