In treating alcohol dependence, different programs and different approaches have been formulated to address drinking problems. Some of these treatments include motivation enhancement therapy, cognitive-behavioral therapy, and the12-step facilitation therapy. Each type of treatment has varied success depending on the history of alcohol dependence of the person or the patients personality. However, modifications of treatments, which may mean combining some aspects of these different types of treatment, can be done, and this is also applicable to how these programs of treatment are delivered. One of the aspects that have often been modified is the duration of the rehabilitation program because some programs have been modified so that peoples rehabilitation are fast-tracked in cases wherein there is a need for the patient to be on his feet at the soonest possible time.

Short-term residential treatment programs

An example of a fast-tracked rehabilitation program is the short-term residential treatment program, which provides an intensive yet brief residential treatment based on a modified 12-step approach. These programs only last for about four to twelve weeks but there are programs that even last for a shorter period of time. These programs provide twenty-four hour day care in a residential setting and the treatment focuses on the resocialization of the alcoholic, which would involve him using the community, which means the staff and other residents, in his efforts to re-integrate himself in society. This is because the program uses the residential setting as a means of re-establishing or developing a persons accountability or responsibility to others, which may have been diminished as a result of the persons alcoholism.

Apart from being able to develop accountability and a sense of responsibility, these programs also offer other forms of rehabilitation. One of this includes employment training, which would also help a person re-integrate himself to the outside world. Given the wide benefits that these programs provide, these programs are usually undertaken by people with long-term alcohol dependence, whose social skills may have greatly been diminished because of their alcoholism

One recent modification of the 12-step therapy undergone by alcoholics is the short-term residential treatment program, which has proven to be effective especially for people with a long history of alcohol dependence. This is because the focus of these programs is the re-integration of rehabilitated alcoholics in society by developing social skills such as accountability, which may have been impaired by the alcoholism.