Assessment of perinatal substance abusers: experiences of one Perinatal-20 project.

This chapter identifies and discusses issues relevant to the psychosocial evaluation of perinatal substance abusers. The conclusions are based on 5 years of experience with 133 women treated at Virginia Commonwealth University’s National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)-funded Treatment Research Unit, the Center for Perinatal Addiction (CPA). The chapter begins with a brief overview of measurement methodology relevant to clinical research and then describes the initial rationale for test selection and presents some measurement problems that have been encountered. After delineating weaknesses in the test protocol, the authors recommend adjustments and suggest areas of exploration for future clinical research projects.