A description and research review of the Clearwater Sex Offender Treatment Programme

This article provides a description and research review of an in-patient sex offender treatment programme, the Clearwater Sex Offender Treatment Programme, over its history of more than two decades of operation at the Regional Psychiatric Centre (RPC) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. We begin by reviewing the Clearwater Programme referral criteria and mandate, its methods of assessment and evaluation and the programme content, structure, treatment philosophy and model of change. A review of applied research undertakings of the Clearwater Programme follows, including past treatment outcome evaluations, examinations of therapeutic change and attention to responsivity considerations (e.g. treatment attrition). We finish with some conclusions, comment on programmatic developments taken by the Clearwater Programme and anticipated future research directions.