Guides, explainers, and things families ask us most.
Published by DetoxNJ.com and drawn from published clinical guidance. Updated regularly.
The First 72 Hours of Medical Detox: What to Expect
In the first 72 hours of medical detox you go through intake, start withdrawal medication chosen for your substance, and have your vital signs and symptoms checked every few hours around the clock through the peak. By the end of day three, most people are past the worst of the physical symptoms and the conversation turns to what comes next.
Read the guideHow to Choose a Detox Facility in New Jersey
Check the license first: every legitimate detox in New Jersey holds a New Jersey Department of Health license, and the state directory confirms it. Then ask who is on site overnight, whether they offer medication for opioid use disorder, and what happens the day you leave. The rest of the ten questions and the red flags follow.
Read the guideA Family Guide to Supporting Detox and Early Recovery
Before detox, handle the logistics that talk people out of going. During it, keep calls short and warm and expect to hear little. After discharge, the most protective thing a family can do is help the next appointment happen. The sections after that cover preparing the home, support versus enabling, and where New Jersey families can get support of their own.
Read the guideMedication-Assisted Treatment: Fact vs Fiction
For opioid use disorder, medication is the treatment with the strongest evidence for keeping people alive: pooled cohort studies in the BMJ (Sordo, 2017) and JAMA Psychiatry (Santo, 2021) found all-cause death rates about half as high or lower during time on methadone or buprenorphine than during time off them. For alcohol use disorder, medication meaningfully helps and works best alongside structured care. It is also the most argued-about part of addiction medicine. Most of the arguments are twenty years old. Here are the nine objections you will hear, and what the evidence says about each.
Read the guideNew Jersey's Insurance Parity Laws for Addiction Treatment
Two laws decide what your insurer can and cannot do when you seek addiction treatment: the federal parity act and New Jersey's 2017 substance use disorder law. Together they are stronger than most people, and some insurers, act like they are. Here is what they say, which plans they cover, and how to use them.
Read the guideAfter Detox: Choosing the Right Next Level of Care
Detox stabilizes the body. It does not treat addiction, and the days after discharge are the highest-risk stretch of the whole process. What you do next matters more than the detox itself. Here is how the levels of care fit together, how clinicians decide which one you need, and how to have it in place before you walk out.
Read the guideAA Meeting Topics: Discussion Ideas, Formats, and NJ Meetings
A good AA topic is a question someone in the room is already living with. Below are more than sixty-five discussion topics organized by theme, how to chair a topic meeting without it stalling, what the different meeting formats mean, and how to find AA in New Jersey. If you are reading this after detox, the meetings are part of the plan, not the whole plan.
Read the guideHow to Get Into Detox in New Jersey: The Admission Process, Step by Step
If anyone is in medical danger right now, call 911 first. If not, call a licensed detox program directly, or call one of New Jersey's free 24/7 lines: ReachNJ at 1-844-732-2465, or the IME Addictions Access Center at 1-844-276-2777 if you have NJ FamilyCare or no insurance. Expect a short screening and an insurance check.
Read the guideRelapse Prevention Plan: A Printable Worksheet
A relapse prevention plan is a short written plan you fill in before you need it: your early warning signs, your triggers, what you will do instead, who you will call, your medications, and what to do if you use. Print the worksheet below, fill it in with a counselor or someone you trust, and keep copies where you will see them.
Read the guideTaking Time Off Work for Detox in New Jersey: Leave, Pay, and Your Job
New Jersey workers have several ways to protect their job and get some pay during detox, each under a different law. Federal FMLA gives up to 12 unpaid, job-protected weeks for treatment at larger employers. NJ Temporary Disability Insurance pays 85% of average weekly wages, up to $1,119 a week in 2026, and since July 17, 2026 its recipients have job protection too. Absence for using, rather than treatment, is not protected.
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Free state lines, 24/7: ReachNJ 1-844-732-2465 · NJ IME Addictions Access Center (Medicaid and uninsured) 1-844-276-2777
Tell us about your situation and a DetoxNJ care navigator will reach out. DetoxNJ is published by Periscope Behavioral Health, which operates or holds an ownership interest in Emerald Wellness, South Jersey Recovery Program, Palm Beach Recovery Centers, Palm Beach Healing Centers, and Transitions Recovery Program, and is developing a medical detox in Hammonton, NJ (expected Summer 2027). We make an introduction only if you ask us to.