Dr. Tim O’Connor, MD
Psychiatrist
Raleigh Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP)
When people think about getting help for substance use or mental health struggles, they often picture leaving home to go to rehab. That’s a common idea, and it makes sense.
When people think about getting help for substance use or mental health struggles, they often picture leaving home to go to rehab. That’s a common idea, and it makes sense.
But there are options that offer a similar level of care without leaving your community.
Our Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP) in Raleigh provides a full-day treatment schedule with a team of experienced providers, without requiring an overnight stay. It’s designed for people who need consistent support while starting to apply what they’re learning in their day-to-day lives.
What is a Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP)?
A Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP) is one of the highest levels of care you can receive without staying overnight.
It involves a full-day schedule during the week, including group therapy, individual sessions, and psychiatric support. At the end of the day, you return home instead of staying in a facility.
That structure creates a different kind of treatment experience. You’re not removed from your environment—you’re working within it.
You leave programming, run into real situations, and come back with something concrete to adjust. Over time, that loop helps build skills that hold up outside of treatment, not just during it.
What Does a Day in PHP Look Like?
A typical day in PHP includes a mix of group therapy, individual sessions, and psychiatric support, all within a structured schedule.
You’ll spend several hours each day in programming that’s built around a clear curriculum. The focus is on helping you reduce chaos, regain stability, and start improving how your day-to-day life functions. This includes building structure, understanding patterns, and developing skills you can use outside of treatment.
The consistency of that schedule helps create momentum, while the daily return to your normal environment gives you a chance to apply what you’re working on and come back with something concrete to adjust.
PHP Schedule at AIM
PHP runs Monday through Friday from 9:30 AM to 2:30 PM, creating a consistent daily structure.
Each day includes a mix of group sessions, individual support, and psychiatric care. Groups are focused on practical skills you can use right away.
Group topics include:
- Motivational interviewing and mindfulness
- Addiction education and understanding patterns
- Emotional regulation and coping skills (DBT)
- ACT and CBT-based skill building
- Relapse prevention and recovery planning
- Relationships, family dynamics, and support systems
- Life skills, structure, and daily routine
- Experiential groups, including art therapy
- Groups led by our medical team to understand the biology of substance use and mental health
The goal is to give you a routine you can build on—one that helps you stay more stable and make better decisions outside of treatment.
PHP Curriculum — What You’ll Work On
The curriculum is built around helping you stabilize, get more consistent, and improve how your life actually functions day to day.
You’ll work on:
- Identifying patterns that are driving substance use and mental health struggles
- Recognizing triggers and how they show up in real time
- Building practical ways to respond instead of reacting
- Learning and applying skills from Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), including emotional regulation, distress tolerance, and interpersonal effectiveness
- Using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to help you stay grounded, clarify what matters, and take actions that result in a more meaningful life.
- Creating structure in your day so things feel more predictable and manageable
- Improving decision-making under stress
- Navigating relationships more effectively
- Putting a plan in place to maintain progress after treatment and decrease relapses.
The goal is to build skills that hold up outside of treatment—at home, at work, and in the situations that tend to be the hardest.
Who is PHP in Raleigh For?
PHP is for people who need a higher level of support without stepping fully out of their daily life.
This often includes:
- Individuals stepping down from residential treatment who want to maintain momentum
- People whose substance use is starting to disrupt work, relationships, or daily routines
- Those experiencing strong cravings, difficulty controlling use, or repeated relapse
- Individuals dealing with withdrawal symptoms, emotional instability, or increased stress that feels hard to manage
- Those who have tried outpatient care but haven’t seen enough change
- Individuals dealing with both substance use and mental health challenges
PHP can be a good fit when things feel unstable, inconsistent, or harder to manage on your own, and more structure is needed to regain control and move forward.
Continuing Your Recovery After Residential Treatment
Residential treatment provides 24-hour care and supervision, and it can be a good fit when that level of support is needed.
But not everyone needs—or can step away from life for—that level of care.
PHP serves as a step down from residential treatment, offering a high level of structure during the day while allowing you to return home at night. This creates a more gradual transition, rather than moving from full-time care back to full independence all at once.
It also works for people who need more support than outpatient care, but don’t require 24-hour supervision.
The goal is to carry forward the progress you’ve made while building the consistency and skills needed to function more independently over time.
What Happens After PHP?
Treatment isn’t meant to stay at one level.
A helpful way to think about it: if someone has a serious medical issue, like a heart problem, they might start in the hospital for close monitoring. As things stabilize, care steps down to the next level—less intensive, but better matched to what they’re dealing with at that point.
Mental health and substance use treatment works in a similar way.
As symptoms become more manageable, many people move from PHP into an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP). This means fewer hours in treatment each week, with more focus on practicing the skills needed to handle that next level of independence.
Because both programs are connected, your care adjusts as you improve. You’re not starting over. You’re just building on what’s already working.
What Makes AIM’s PHP Different?
Not all programs are built the same. One of the biggest differences is what happens after you get started.
What sets our program apart:
- Evidenced-based and effective programming and curriculum
- A care plan that adjusts over time, with the level of support matching where you are
- Early access to psychiatry, including medication support for cravings, withdrawal symptoms, and co-occurring mental health concerns
- Integrated care for both substance use and mental health, rather than treating them separately
- A team of providers with different areas of expertise, allowing for more individualized support
- In-network with most major insurance plans, making expert care more accessible
- A structured daily program that still allows you to return home and stay connected to your life
- A focus on applying skills in real situations, not just talking about them in sessions
Just as important is what happens after the program.
You can continue working with your psychiatrist and therapist as you improve, instead of losing support or having to start over somewhere new. Your care stays consistent, even as you need less of it.
The goal is simple: you can start here, and your care keeps moving with you as things get better.
How Effective is PHP?
PHP can be highly effective for individuals who need more structure and consistency than outpatient care provides.
At AIM, the focus is on combining daily support, skill-building, and real-world application—so progress doesn’t stay inside the program, it carries into your day-to-day life. That approach is reflected in the outcomes we see across our substance use services.
Our Outcomes:
- 65% of patients who entered care with active substance use were able to reach zero use during treatment
- Average substance use scores dropped by 79% over the course of care
- 84% of patients showed improvement in key risk factors related to relapse
- 60% showed gains in protective factors like structure, stability, and support
- 85% of patients who entered treatment without active use were able to maintain it
These outcomes tend to follow when care is consistent, connected, and practiced in day-to-day life.
How Do I Know if PHP is Right for Me?
Most people don’t show up knowing they need PHP. They show up because something isn’t improving, or because things are starting to have more consequences.
PHP may make sense if:
- You’ve tried therapy or outpatient care, but things haven’t really shifted
- Substance use is starting to impact your work, relationships, finances, or daily responsibilities
- You’re dealing with cravings, relapse, or patterns that are hard to break on your own
- Anxiety, depression, or mood swings are making it harder to function day to day
- You feel stuck in cycles that keep repeating, even when you’re trying to change
- You’ve recently completed residential treatment and want to maintain progress
- You need more structure during the week to regain stability
Another way to think about it: if things feel like they’re slipping, becoming harder to manage, or starting to affect important parts of your life, it may be time for more consistent support.
You don’t have to figure this out on your own. Our team can help you talk through what’s going on and decide whether this level of care makes sense, or if there’s a better place to start.
Lindsay Hildreth, PA-C, CAQ-Psychiatry
Psychiatric Physician Assistant
Elizabeth Morgan, PA-C
Psychiatric Physician Assistant
Madeline Hooper, MSW, LCSW
Clinical Therapist
Our PHP Team
Our PHP team includes therapists, psychiatrists, and clinical staff who work closely together throughout your time in the program.
We bring together providers with experience in substance use, anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and other mental health conditions, allowing for true dual-diagnosis care. This range of expertise helps ensure that what you’re dealing with is understood in full, not treated in pieces.
Because the team is involved throughout the program, care can adjust in real time—whether that means shifting the focus in therapy, addressing new challenges, or incorporating medication support when it’s helpful.
The goal is to have the right people involved at the right time, so care stays relevant as things change.
Get Started with Addiction Treatment in Raleigh
If you’re considering PHP, you don’t need to figure it out on your own. Reach out to our team to ask questions, verify insurance, or discuss whether this level of care makes sense for you.
We’re happy to help you sort through your options and get you started on your path to recovery.