Welcome to the Peer Recovery Center of Excellence’s Resource Library. We have curated these resources in order to support peers and organizations who offer peer recovery support services (PRSS). Resources include toolkits, journal articles, multimedia, presentation slides, and more. You will find information regarding integrating PRSS into new settings, Recovery Community Organization (RCO) capacity building, PRSS workforce development, and best and emerging practices for the delivery of PRSS. As part of our MAI project, we have also gathered HIV-related resources here. You can search by topic, resource type, or simply browse the list below.
If you would like to check out products from the PR CoE, please see our Product Library.
Journal Article
Peer recovery support services (PRSS) are increasingly being employed in a range of clinical settings to assist individuals with substance use disorder (SUD) and co-occurring psychological disorders. PRSS are peer-driven mentoring, education, and support ministrations delivered by individuals who, because of their own experience with SUD and SUD recovery, are experientially qualified to support peers currently experiencing SUD and associated problems. This systematic review characterizes the existing experimental, quasi-experimental, single- and multi-group prospective and retrospective, and cross-sectional research on PRSS.
Curriculum or Toolkit
Addressing Stress and Trauma in Recovery-oriented Systems and Communities: A Challenge to Leadership
Workbook addressing stress and trauma among Recovery Oriented Systems of Care.
Curriculum or Toolkit
Cultural Humility Primer: Peer Support Specialist and Recovery Coach Guide
This primer was created as an entry level cultural reference for Peer Support Specialists and Recovery Coaches working in both substance use disorder and mental health fields. Sections include:
An appendix features a wealth of additional resources, including glossaries of terms and acronyms, references, and tools.
Relapse Prevention for Recovering Counselors/Peer Advocates
This webinar is from the Northeast & Caribbean ATTC. There has been much written about relapse prevention for persons recovering from alcohol and other drugs. However, counselors and peer advocates face unique challenges, which usually are not discussed. This webinar will focus on developing skills for counselors/peer advocates on the job and in their personal lives to maintain recovery.
Privacy, security, and confidentiality issues are essential to peer support services, not just treatment services. Peer Support Specialists or Recovery Coaches that work for substance use disorder treatment providers should seek guidance from the treatment provider regarding privacy and security issues (HIPAA) and adherence to 42 CFR Part 2 (Federal Confidentiality Rules and Regulations) regarding the use of technology to provide peer support services. Peer Support Specialists/Recovery Coaches that work for a Recovery Community Organization (RCOs) or other community organizations should seek guidance regarding the organization’s policies/practices regarding providing services remotely using technology.
Rescued Lives: The Oxford House Approach to Substance Abuse
This paper explains how to start self-run, self-supported recovery houses in your state. It is a simple concept, based on the Oxford House experience, and provides a cost-effective way to help thousands of individuals recovering from alcoholism and drug addiction to avoid a return to addiction by living a comfortable life without the use of alcohol and drugs. Recovering individuals living together in the disciplined environment of an Oxford House in a good neighborhood are almost always able to help each other stay clean and sober without relapse.
Resources for an Evolving Crisis: Preventing Overdose from Combined Substances
Attention to polysubstance use is urgently needed as we respond to the evolving overdose crisis. The aim of this resource page is to provide communities—including health and human services providers, individuals with substance use disorder, their families and friends, and local leaders—with convenient, evidence-based tools to use and share in addressing these risks.
Resources for the Supervision of Peer Workers
The resources on this list provide education on peer support practices, best practices in supervision, and recovery-oriented services.
Role Clarity in Peer Recovery Support Services: Navigating the Terms
In this rapidly growing and ever-evolving field of peer recovery support services (PRSS), language often carries different meanings depending on region, State, or a particular program. This can lead to misunderstandings or miscommunication. This document is designed to assist Targeted Capacity Expansion—Peer-to-Peer (TCE-PTP) grantees define and clarify key roles and terms that are part of the TCE-PTP grant project: peer leader, peer participant, peer leadership, and peer leader advisory councils.
Rural Opioid and Direct Support Services (ROADSS) for Methadone Maintenance Treatment
For people with substance use disorder (SUD), the road to recovery can be long and hard. And in rural communities, where rates of overdose mortality have increased at higher rates than in urban areas, limited access to treatment makes the journey even more difficult. The ROADSS program addresses that disparity by bringing treatment and resources that have been proven to save lives closer to home.
SAMHSA's 2022 Recovery Summit Executive Summary
SAMHSA has posted an Executive Summary of the August 2022 Recovery Now! Summit that the agency hosted for 200 in-person and virtual participants to collaborate on the Office of Recovery’s National Recovery Agenda. Representatives included persons with lived experience of mental health or substance use challenges and recovery, substance use preventionists, harm reductionists, treatment and recovery support providers, researchers, staff of federal and state partners, and other allies. Several team members from the Peer Recovery Center of Excellence were in attendance and helped facilitate conversations.
SAMHSA's Best Practices for Recovery Housing
This document updates SAMHSA's 2018 document and outlines best practices for the implementation and operation of recovery housing. These best practices are intended to serve as a tool for states, governing bodies, providers, recovery house operators, and other interested stakeholders to improve the health of their citizens, reduce incidence of overdose, and promote recovery housing as a key support strategy in achieving and sustaining recovery.
SAMHSA's Evidence-Based Practices Resource Center
SAMHSA is committed to improving prevention, treatment, and recovery support services for mental and substance use disorders. The Evidence-Based Practices Resource Center provides communities, clinicians, policy-makers and others with the information and tools to incorporate evidence-based practices into their communities or clinical settings.
The N-SUMHSS is a voluntary annual survey of all active substance use and mental health facilities in the United States, its territories, and D.C. The annual report presents findings on the key operational characteristics of substance use and mental health treatment facilities, use of pharmacotherapies, language assistance services, and suicide prevention assistance services.
SAMHSA's Recovery from Substance Use and Mental Health Problems Among Adults in the United States
This brief report presents self-reports of recovery among adults aged 18 and older in the United States who thought they ever had a problem with their use of drugs or alcohol and/or mental health. These findings provide a clearer characterization of the factors associated with recovery among adults and how future efforts can foster a whole-health approach to sustain recovery from mental health and substance use conditions.
Funding for this initiative was made possible by grant no. 1H79TI083022 from SAMHSA. The views expressed in written conference materials or publications and by speakers and moderators do not necessarily reflect the official policies of the Department of Health and Human Services; nor does mention of trade names, commercial practices, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.