Alcohol and other drug treatment services in Australia annual report 2023–24

There are a number of treatment types available to assist people receiving treatment for alcohol or drug use, most of which aim to reduce the harm of drug use through services such as counselling, rehabilitation or information and education. For a subset of people who use alcohol and drugs, treatment and support will be required over the course of their life (consistent with dependence being a chronic condition, like asthma or diabetes). In many cases, people may require ongoing support to achieve long-term change. For other people, early support and treatment will be sufficient to reduce harms and prevent the need for further treatment or they may access treatment intermittently as required (Department of Health and Aged Care 2019).

Treatment types

People can receive treatment for their own or someone else’s alcohol or drug use (see Key terminology and glossary). Rehabilitation, withdrawal management (detoxification) and pharmacotherapy are not available for people who received treatment for someone else’s alcohol or drug use. 

In 2023–24:

• A total of 240,958 closed treatment episodes were provided to 131,892 people for their own or someone else’s alcohol or drug use.
• Clients received an average of 1.8 treatment episodes each (Table SCR.21).
• 125,163 (90%) people received treatment for their own alcohol or drug use and 13,167 (9.5%) people received treatment in relation to someone else’s alcohol or drug use (Table SCR.30).

Trends between 2014–15 and 2023–24, include:

• Treatment episodes increased by 41% from 170,367 to 240,958.
• Compared with 2022–23 treatment episodes increased by 5.5% (235,461 to 240,958).
• Clients receiving treatment increased by 15% from 114,460 to 131,892, peaking in 2019–20 (139,271 clients).
• Compared with 2022–23, client numbers increased by 0.3% from 131,516 to 131,892.

Treatment episodes for clients who received treatment for own or other’s drug use

In 2023–24:

• 9 in 10 treatment episodes (91%, 219,277) were provided for a client’s own alcohol or drug use.
• 1 in 10 (9.0%, 21,681) treatment episodes were in relation to someone else’s alcohol or drug use (Table Trt.2).

Among clients receiving treatment for their own alcohol or drug use (122,582):

• Counselling was the most common treatment across most age groups followed by assessment only, except for:
  • Clients aged 10–19, where it was counselling (46%) followed by support and case management (25%).
  • Clients aged over 60, where it was assessment only (36%) followed by counselling (32%).
• Older clients aged 40 and over were more likely to receive withdrawal management as a main treatment type (8.1–9.6%) than younger clients (3.2–6.1%).

Among clients who received support for someone else’s alcohol or drug use (9,310), the age of clients varied by main treatment type:

• Counselling was the most common treatment provided to:
  • Half (49%) of clients aged 40–49.
  • 3 in 5 (62%) clients aged 50–59.
  • 7 in 10 (71%) clients aged over 60.  
• 1 in 3 clients aged 10–19 (36%) and 20–29 (37%), received support and case management (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 1, Table SC.19).

Trends in main treatment types

The types of main treatments clients have received have changed over time, reflecting the changes in service delivery.

For treatment episodes provided for a client’s own alcohol or drug use (219,277) over the 10-year period to 2023–24:

• Counselling has remained the most common treatment type, gradually declining from a high of 39% (63,145) of episodes in 2014–15 to 33% (71,948) in 2023–24.
• The proportion of episodes with withdrawal management as main treatment dropped from 13% (21,859) in 2014–15 to 9.9% (21,776) in 2023–24.
• Assessment only increased from 17% to 23%, whereas support and case management rose from 8.5% to 13% and other main treatment increased (from 2.5% to 9.4%) over this period.

For treatment episodes provided to those who received support for someone else’s alcohol or drug use (21,681) over the 10-year period to 2023–24:

• Until 2020–21, counselling was the most common treatment type, ranging from a high of 73% of episodes in 2016–17 before declining to its lowest level in 2023–24, 35%.
• Support and case management became the most common main treatment increasing over 8-fold in the 10 years to 2021–22, increasing slightly from 8.0–10% between 2014–15 and 2017–18 before increasing steadily and peaking to 46% (8,355) in 2022–23, and remaining stable in 2023–24 (45%) (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3).
  • This increase may be due in part to changes in coding practices for support and case management in 2019–20. The word ‘only’ was removed (support and case management only) allowing agencies to more accurately capture this treatment type in conjunction with other treatment types.

Trends in main treatment type have changed over time, reflecting in part changing client needs, service delivery practices and expansion, changes in coding practices/methodology in the collection and state and territory policies.

For treatment episodes (240,958) provided to all clients over the 10-year period to 2023–24:

• Counselling was the most common treatment type, ranging from 68,174 episodes (40%) in 2014–15 to a high of 92,455 (38%) in 2020–21 before decreasing to 79,471 (33%) in 2023–24 (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3). The peak recorded in 2020–21 coincided with:
  • The first and second waves of the COVID-19 pandemic and reflected AOD services adapting to other ways of delivering AOD treatment, such as, telehealth models.
  • Changes to coding practices: prior to 2020–21 treatment episodes provided to people diverted into AOD services by police and court diversion programs were recorded as information and education.  From 2020–21, diversion programs are now reported as counselling in a few states. Caution should be used when comparing these data over time.
• Assessment only episodes have steadily increased from 28,709 (17%) in 2014–15 to 51,859 (22%) in 2023–24 (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3). This increase may be due in part to recording a separate assessment only episode, prior to the commencement of the treatment episode in some states and territories.
• Support and case management episodes increased from 14,524 (8.5%) in 2014–15 to 38,402 (16%) in 2023–24 (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3).

• Information and education episodes remained relatively steady between 2014–15 (17,588, 10%) and 2018–19 (18,039, 8.2%) before declining sharply (2023–24 5,748 or 2.4%) (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3). This was due to:
  • Coding changes prior to 2020–21 for treatment episodes provided to people diverted into AOD services by police and court diversion programs were recorded as information and education. From 2020–21, police and court diversion programs are now reported as counselling. Caution should be used when comparing these data over time.
• ‘Other’ main treatment type increased from 4,436 (2.6%) in 2014–15 to 22,760 (9.5%) in 2023–24 (Figure TREATMENT CLIENTS 2, Table Trt.3). This increase is noticeable from 2019–20 and likely relates to:
  • Changes in coding of ‘other’ during COVID-19 where agencies were adapting to telephone/video conference consultations.
• the AODTS NMDS collection see 2023–24 AODTS NMDS Data Quality Statement.

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