Choosing a treatment program is a high stakes purchase made by people in the worst week of their life, usually over the phone, usually in a hurry. That combination attracts good providers and it attracts bad ones. The defense is not intuition. It is a list of specific questions, asked in the same order to every program you call, so you can compare actual answers instead of comparing how nice everyone sounded.

Here are the fifteen we would ask if we were calling on behalf of someone we love. We answer all of them about ourselves at the end, because a list like this is worthless from a program that will not sit for its own test.

Questions about licensing and legitimacy

Start here. If a program fails this section, nothing else matters and you can end the call politely.

1. What is your state license number, and what does it cover?

In California, substance use disorder programs are licensed and certified by the Department of Health Care Services. A legitimate provider will give you the number without hesitation and without asking why you want it. Then verify it yourself rather than taking their word: the DHCS licensing pages and the state's open data set of licensed and certified facilities let you match the name, address, and number. Two minutes of checking eliminates a surprising number of options.

2. Who owns this facility, and are you the program I would attend?

This question exists because of call centers. Some phone numbers that appear to belong to a treatment center route to a third party marketing operation that sells the call to whichever facility is paying. If you cannot get a clear answer about who owns the program and whether you are speaking with the actual clinic, assume you are not.

3. Do you pay for referrals, or receive payment for them?

Ask it directly and listen to how it lands. Paying for patient referrals, known as patient brokering, is illegal in California, and it is the mechanism behind the worst abuses in this industry. A legitimate provider will answer no and will not be offended you asked.

Questions about the clinical program

This section tells you whether you are buying treatment or buying an amenity package with treatment attached.

4. What levels of care do you offer, and what do you not offer?

A program that claims to do everything for everyone is telling you something. Ask what they do not provide, and what happens if you need it. We do not provide detox or residential care, for instance, so we refer out for both. Knowing a program's edges is more informative than knowing its brochure.

5. Who leads the groups, and what are their credentials?

This is the question programs least like to answer precisely, and it may be the most revealing on the list. Group is where most of the clinical hours happen, and it is also where weak programs cut costs by staffing with the least qualified people available. Ask for roles and credentials: LMFT, LCSW, LPCC for licensed clinicians, and RADT, CADC, or SUDCC for counselors. Ask whether the person named on the website will actually be in your room.

6. What is your client to clinician ratio in group and in individual therapy?

Get numbers, not adjectives. A group of eight is a different experience from a group of twenty five. Ask how many individual sessions per week are included, not available at extra cost.

7. What evidence based therapies do you use, and how often?

You are looking for named modalities with a research base, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavior therapy, motivational interviewing, and trauma focused approaches. Then ask the follow up that separates real programming from a list on a website: how many hours a week of each, and who delivers it. The National Institute on Drug Abuse overview of treatment approaches is a useful reference for what belongs in a serious program.

8. How do you handle co occurring mental health conditions?

Roughly half of people with a substance use disorder have another mental health condition, and treating only one usually means treating neither. Ask whether there is a psychiatrist or psychiatric nurse practitioner on the team, how quickly you would see them, and whether the therapy addresses both conditions together. That integration is what dual diagnosis treatment means, and many programs use the phrase without doing it.

9. Do you offer medication assisted treatment?

For opioid use disorder, medications such as buprenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone are standard of care, and a program that refuses them on philosophical grounds is out of step with the evidence. There are also medications for alcohol use disorder. Ask what is prescribed, by whom, and whether you can continue medication after discharge. Our approach is described on our medication management page.

10. What happens if I use during treatment?

The answer reveals the program's entire philosophy. Automatic discharge after a lapse sounds tough and works poorly, since it removes care at the exact moment the person needs it most. The better answer describes a clinical response: a plan review, possibly a higher level of care, and continued treatment. Ask what the drug testing policy is while you are on the subject.

Questions about logistics, cost, and what comes after

11. What is the total expected cost, and what is my responsibility in writing?

Ask for the whole picture: what insurance is expected to cover, your deductible and coinsurance, what happens if a claim is denied, and whether there are charges outside the program fee, such as labs or medication. Any program can verify benefits for free. A program that will not put your expected responsibility in writing before you enroll is one to walk away from. We cover the mechanics in how much rehab costs and what insurance covers, and you can verify your own plan here.

12. What is the schedule, and does it fit my actual life?

Get the real timetable: days, hours, whether there are evening tracks, and whether telehealth is available. In Los Angeles this question decides completion more often than clinical quality does, because a program you cannot reach by 6pm is a program you will eventually stop attending.

13. How long is the program, and how do you decide when I am done?

A specific number with no clinical reasoning behind it is a billing answer. What you want to hear is how length is reassessed, what the step down looks like, and what happens if you need more time. Realistic ranges are in how long rehab actually lasts.

14. What does aftercare include, and is it part of the program or an upsell?

The month after discharge is the highest risk period in the whole process. Ask what specifically happens: is there an alumni program, are there continuing care groups, who writes the aftercare plan, and does anyone follow up if you stop showing. Programs that treat completion as the end are the ones people relapse out of.

15. Can I tour the facility and meet a clinician before I commit?

For outpatient care especially, walk the space. See the group rooms, see the parking, and meet at least one person who would treat you. A program that will not show you the rooms is hiding either the rooms or the staffing. You are about to spend many hours a week in that building.

Red flags that should end the call Guaranteed cures or specific success rate promises. Offers to pay for your travel or to waive your entire deductible. Pressure to admit today. Vagueness about ownership or clinical staff. A recruiter who will not say which facility they work for. Any of these on their own is enough.

Why you should distrust any success rate you are quoted

Someone will eventually tell you their program has a 90 percent success rate. Ask three follow up questions and watch what happens: success defined how, measured at what point after discharge, and what percentage of discharged clients were actually reached for follow up.

Almost no one can answer all three, because there is no standardized definition and no independent auditing of these claims. Programs that measure abstinence at 30 days among people who volunteered to answer a survey can produce nearly any number they want. Meanwhile the honest clinical picture, per NIDA, is that relapse rates of 40 to 60 percent are typical for a chronic condition, comparable to hypertension and asthma. A program quoting 90 percent is either measuring something narrow or making it up. We do not publish a success rate, and that is deliberate.

Our answers to all fifteen

It would be cheap to publish this list without submitting to it, so here is the short version for Golden State Rehab.

Two last pieces of advice. Call at least three programs, because you cannot evaluate an answer without a comparison. And notice how you are treated when you say you need to think about it. The reaction to that sentence tells you more about a program than any answer on this list.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I check if a rehab is licensed in California?

Use the California Department of Health Care Services licensing pages, or search the state open data set of licensed and certified SUD recovery and treatment facilities. Look up the facility by name and address, and confirm the license number the facility publishes matches the state record. Golden State Rehab is DHCS licensed under number 191643AP.

What credentials should rehab staff have?

In California, look for licensed clinicians such as LMFT, LCSW, or LPCC for therapy, a board certified physician for medical oversight, and certified or registered counselors such as RADT, CADC, or SUDCC for counseling roles. Ask specifically who leads groups, since that is where programs most often use the least qualified staff.

What are the biggest red flags in a rehab facility?

Guaranteed cures or fixed success rates, offers to pay for your flight or waive your entire deductible, vagueness about who owns the facility, refusal to name the clinicians who will treat you, and pressure to admit today. Paying for patient referrals is illegal in California, and aggressive brokering is the most common form it takes.

Should I tour a facility before enrolling?

Yes, and a program that will not let you see the space should be ruled out. For outpatient care in Los Angeles you should walk the group rooms, see where you would park, and meet at least one clinician. You are about to spend several hours a week in that building, and how the room feels matters more than how the website looks.

Print this list, or keep it open while you call. Ask us the same fifteen questions you ask everyone else at (424) 208-3120. If another program in Los Angeles is a better fit for what you need, we would rather point you there than take an admission we cannot serve well.