History
The Alliance for Addiction Solutions AAS was established September 29, 2007, in Sacramento, California, at the conclusion of the first Beyond Talk Therapy: New Frontiers in Addiction Treatment Symposium. A group of 21 speakers and participants joyfully discovered they had a common need to join others who understood the biochemical basis of addiction and used similar drug-free techniques to create lasting recovery.
The Symposium was sponsored the Community Addiction Recovery Association (CARA), a Sacramento non-profit dedicated to the use of acupuncture, nutrition, movement therapies, and other drug-free techniques to repair the addicted brain.
For some members, the Alliance for Addiction Solutions offers their first opportunity to network in harmony with colleagues throughout the United States and Canada to accomplish their mutual goals. AAS members are also dedicated to educating the public about the growing field of holistic therapies for healing those whose lives have been shattered by addiction.
Founding members are listed below, with current members linked to their profiles:
Lianne Audette, ND,LAcAudette holds a California license and is nationally certified to practice acupuncture. She has been integrating acupuncture into drug and alcohol treatment settings for the past 11 years. These settings have included homeless shelters, halfway houses, drop-in clinics, day treatment, residential and outpatient treatment facilities, and drug courts.
In 1990, she founded a privately funded nonprofit community clinic known as Turnabout A.S.A.P. in Santa Monica to provide treatment to low and no income addicts on a walk-in basis.
Holly Beardsley, MSWBeardsley has a private practice in Nevada City, California, integrating nutrition and bioenergetics. Using techniques of Quantum Reflex Analysis (QRA), she helps people balance their body and brain biochemistry for optimum health both physically and mentally, specializing in addictions of all kinds, ADD/ADHD, mood disorders, and other physical health issues.
Hyla Cass, MD Cass graduated from the University of Toronto School of Medicine, interned at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, and completed a psychiatric residency at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center/UCLA School of Medicine. She was an Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCLA School of Medicine until 2005, and is in private clinical practice in Pacific Palisades, California.
Janet Czarske, LAc
Charles Gant, MD, PhDGant received his BS in chemistry from Hampden-Sydney College, his medical degree from the University of Virginia Medical School, and his PhD in psychology from Columbia Pacific University. Dr. Gant is also a board certified Naturopath. He practices in Washington, DC, as an ND. Dr. Gant is nationally recognized for devising nutritional and detoxification interventions.
John Giordano, CAPGiordano is the president and founder of the prestigious G & G Holistic Addiction Treatment Center - a 62 bed in-patient/out-patient JACHO accredited addiction treatment facility - he started over twenty years ago. Mr. Giordano is a therapist, a Certified Addiction Professional (CAP), a Master Addictions Counselor (MAC), and a Certified Criminal Justice Specialist (CCJS). Mr. Giordano also earned a Masters Certification in Neurolinguistics Programming (NLP), and is a Certified Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Specialist and a professional expert witness for the state and federal government.
Burton Goldberg is on a mission to reform conventional medicine and to help people reclaim their health. He’s a dynamo, traveling, speaking, and teaching all over the country three weeks out of every month. He’s spent over 30 years carefully researching every aspect of holistic medicine, from California to Israel, Mexico to Russia. But it’s taken only a few years for this self-made businessman to emerge as The Voice of Alternative Medicine.
Sadhu Singh Khalsa, LISW
Mark Mathews, LADC, BCCR Mathews is the co-founder of Bio-Recovery, Inc. (est.1994), dedicated to developing unique nutritional formulas to repair the brain damaged from chemicals. Working with biochemists and orthomolecular nutritionists, Mark has co-developed several formulas to stabilize mental imbalances in addiction treatment.
Joan Mathews-Larson PhDJoan Mathews-Larson holds a doctorate in nutrition and is the founder and executive director of the pioneering Health Recovery Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, an orthomolecular (psycho-biological) model for treating addiction and emotional disorders. This unique focus combines therapy with physiological intervention to repair biochemical damage that often manifests as impaired mental functioning and behavioral problems. Her work has received national recognition because of the high recovery rates this model produces.
David Miller, PhDDavid Miller, PhD, has worked in the addiction field for 25 years. The focus of his work has been on inding alternative treatment methods to aid those for whom conventional treatment has not worked. He believes that many of these people are not unmotivated but are attempting to cope with physical problems that interfere with their ability to stay sober.
Merlene Miller, MAMerlene Miller, MA, is an addiction educator and author with 25 years of experience in the addiction field, specializing in relapse prevention. She has conducted relapse prevention workshops and retreats as well as staff training for state and national conferences. She developed the Addiction Studies curriculum for Park University in Parkville, Missouri, where she taught for 11 years and at Graceland University in Independence, Missouri, where she was an Associate Professor for six years.
David Moyer, LCSW, Board Certified Diplomate, Lt Col USAF, Ret
David Moyer, retired Lt Col, USAF, is an Alaska licensed clinical social worker who served 28 years as a therapist and mental health administrator in the United States Air Force. Since retiring from the Air Force he has researched and writtenabout innovative solutions to the problem of mental illness. He is the author of Too Good to be True? Nutrients Quiet the Unquiet Brain and is currently working on his second book due to be published early in 2009. Entitled Beyond Mental Illness, this book will explore alternatives to current typologies used to classify mental illness and drug and alcohol abuse.
Neal uses comprehensive treatment approaches that are evidence-based to produce results: MRT (Moral Reconation Therapy), Interactive Journaling, 12-Step group sessions, individual sessions, and family sessions.
Cardwell C. Nuckols, PhD
Carolyn Reuben, LAc Reuben is a founding member of the Board of Directors of CARA and on the Executive Committee of the Alliance for Addiction Solutions. She is a licensed acupuncturist, medical journalist, and the author of four self-help health books.
Julia Ross, MA, MFT A pioneer in the field of addiction recovery, Julia Ross has founded and directed eight treatment programs in the San Francisco Bay Area since 1980. As director of outpatient programs at the Henry Ohloff House, Ross instituted seven programs in three counties, including the area's first treatment programs for the addicted family system, for addicted adolescents, and for marijuana and food-addicted individuals. Ross is currently the Executive Director of the Recovery Systems Outpatient Clinic in Marin County (1988 to present).
Trudy Scott, CN (Certified Nutritionist), BSS, BS
Scott’s emphasis is on educating successful women about a healthy and balanced lifestyle, dietary choices based on a whole-foods approach and individualized nutrient supplementation as needed - so “you can be your healthiest, look your best and feel on-top-of-the-world emotionally."
Patricia Smith, MS, LPCSmith has worked in the field of addictions since 1985 and has been instrumental in founding and developing successful addiction treatment programs. She believes strongly in biochemical repair and a nutritional approach to addiction treatment.
Stan Stokes, MS, LPC, CCDCStokes, MS, LPC, CCDC, is the Founder and CEO of Bridging the Gaps, Inc., an integrative substance abuse treatment facility for adults in Winchester, Virginia. He has more than 30 years’ experience in the addictions field, both in the military and private sectors.
Christina Veselak, MS, LMFT, CN
Veselak has been a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist for over 23 years. She has specialized in working with addicts/alcoholics, and their family members. She began her career working with alcoholic teenage boys in a long-term residential program and then ran the family program in a hospital in-patient CD unit.
Beth Ann Voien, PhD.
