Take it Personal!+: a personalized treatment for substance use disorder in people with mild intellectual disability and borderline intellectual functioning

The prevalence of problematic substance use in people with intellectual disabilities (ID) is alarming. The need for treatment adapted to this target group is high. Available treatments are directed to a heterogeneous group of individuals with ID and there is hardly any evidence for their effectiveness. Differentiation is needed because an ‘one size fits all’ treatment does not fit.
The aim of this study is to evaluate a personalized treatment: Take it Personal!+. The effectiveness wil be tested with a non-concurrent multiple baseline across individuals design. Besides it will be tested how positive and negative affect, craving levels and substance intertwine and change during the different study phases. The study design consists of four phases: baseline phase (7 – 11 days), intervention phase (11 weeks), post treatment (1 month) and a follow-up phase (3 months after intervention). Participants are individuals with a mild intellectual disability or borderline intellectual functioning (MID-BIF) and substance use disorder.

1) Take it Personal!+ will lead to a significant decrease in substance abuse.
2) Take it Personal!+ will lead to a significant increase in personal and social recovery.

Baseline phase (7- 9 days)
Intervention phase (11 weeks)
Post-treament phase (1 month)
Follow-up phase (3 months after intervention)

Take it Personal!+ is a personalized treatment based on motivational interviewing and cognitive behavioural therapy. Take it Personal!+ last 11 weeks with two sessions (Session A and B) a week, of 45 minutes. Session A is an individual session with the participant and session B is with the participant and a confidant from his/her social network or from the professional care.

The treatment consists of the following key components: 1) motivation to behaviour change, 2) psycho-education regarding personality profile, 3) setting goals and make a plan to change, 4) recognise personality profile and coherent signals of problematic behaviour, 5) set up a functional analysis, 6) increasing self-control, 7) behavioural coping training and cognitive coping training, and 8) relapse prevention. The intervention will be personalized based on the four personality profiles (anxiety sensitivity, negative thinking, impulsivity, sensation seeking).
Part of the treatment is the use of TiP!: the supporting mHealth application. TiP! consists of the following components: 1) exercises, 2) week goals and how to achieve them, 3) future wishes and how to achieve them, 4) help! button, 5) information about self-control skills, refusal skills and positive and negative thoughts, 6) relapse prevention plan, and 7) gaining accessories for the avatar and points for personal rewards. Additionally, the participant will receive personalized feedback in TiP!