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About MRS Rehab

For 24 years, MRS Rehab has transformed moments of crisis into foundations of lasting calm for families across Lincoln and Placer County.

MRS Rehab founding

Our Story

In 2002, Dr. Margaret Reyes-Santos buried her younger brother. He was 31, bright, generous, and six years deep into an opioid addiction that no treatment center in Northern California seemed equipped to handle. Every facility he entered treated the substance but ignored the panic attacks, the childhood trauma, the fractured family relationships that kept pulling him back into use. After his funeral, Margaret stood on the front steps of the church on G Street in Lincoln and made a promise to the family gathered around her: she would build the kind of place that could have saved him.

She sold her private practice, partnered with two addiction medicine specialists, and opened the doors of MRS Rehab at 537 G Street. The founding principle was simple but radical for its time: treat the whole crisis, not just the chemical. That meant hiring trauma therapists alongside detox nurses, opening a family lodge so loved ones could participate in treatment from the start, and creating a harm-reduction framework that met patients where they stood rather than demanding perfection on day one.

Twenty-four years and over 13,000 patients later, that promise still guides every decision we make. Our 45-bed facility has grown from a converted Victorian house to a modern treatment campus, but the mission has never shifted. We exist because one family lost someone they should not have lost, and we work every day to ensure yours does not face the same outcome.

Our Values

Our Mission

Our mission is to restore families shattered by addiction. We believe that recovery cannot happen in isolation because addiction never strikes in isolation. When one person suffers, parents lose sleep, children grow fearful, and partners carry burdens they were never meant to shoulder alone. At MRS Rehab, every treatment plan is built around the understanding that lasting sobriety requires a healed family system, not just a sober individual. We measure our success not only by abstinence milestones but by the dinners shared, the phone calls returned, and the trust slowly rebuilt between the people who matter most to each other.

Treatment Philosophy

Our treatment philosophy rests on three pillars that move patients from crisis to sustained stability:

  • Harm-Reduction Continuum: We do not demand perfection as a prerequisite for care. Our harm-reduction model meets you at whatever stage of readiness you bring through the door and builds forward incrementally. Progress, not perfection, drives every clinical decision.
  • Trauma-Informed Approach: Addiction is almost always entangled with unresolved trauma. Every member of our 92-person staff is trained to recognize and respond to trauma cues. From the way we design intake interviews to the way our counselors structure group sessions, safety and trust come before everything else.
  • Community Reintegration: Treatment that ends at discharge is incomplete. We prepare residents to re-enter Lincoln life with concrete tools: job readiness workshops, family communication plans, local support group connections, and alumni programming that keeps you tethered to a recovery community long after you leave our facility.
Therapy session at MRS Rehab

Our Team

Dr. Margaret Reyes-Santos

Founder & Clinical Director

A board-certified psychiatrist who left private practice after a personal family loss to build MRS Rehab from the ground up. With over 28 years in addiction medicine, Dr. Reyes-Santos oversees all clinical programming and ensures that the crisis-to-calm framework remains central to every patient interaction.

Nathan Okafor, LMFT

Director of Family Services

Nathan spent a decade working with families in the Placer County foster care system before joining MRS Rehab. He designed our family therapy curriculum and leads the family lodge programming, helping parents, spouses, and children understand their roles in the recovery ecosystem.

Sofia Chen, RN, CARN

Head of Detox & Medical Services

A Certified Addictions Registered Nurse with 15 years of emergency and detox experience, Sofia leads our medical team through the critical first hours and days of stabilization. Her calm, methodical approach to withdrawal management sets the tone for the entire treatment experience.

Jared Whitfield, CADC-II

Peer Recovery Coordinator

Jared is an MRS Rehab alumnus who completed our residential program in 2014. Now nine years in recovery, he coordinates peer mentorship pairings, facilitates SMART Recovery groups, and serves as living proof that the crisis-to-calm model produces lasting results.

What Our Alumni Say

I was a marketing director who drank behind closed doors for eight years. When my firm found out, I thought my career was finished. MRS Rehab built a schedule around my professional obligations so I could maintain my responsibilities while actually getting better. The CBT sessions helped me identify the triggers hidden inside my high-pressure workdays, and the private rooms gave me the space to process without judgment. Fourteen months sober now, and I just got promoted.

- Darren W., Lincoln, CA

I was 23 and already on my way to losing everything. Opioids had taken over my sophomore year and by the time I dropped out, I barely recognized myself. Walking into MRS Rehab felt like the first honest thing I had done in years. The group therapy sessions with other young adults showed me I was not the only one fighting this battle at my age. The outdoor fitness area became my morning ritual, and the counselors helped me plan a future I actually wanted to wake up for. I re-enrolled last semester.

- Kayla M., Rocklin, CA

Four treatment centers in seven years. I had almost accepted that I would never get clean. What made MRS Rehab different was the dual diagnosis work. No one had ever treated my anxiety alongside my methamphetamine addiction before. The EMDR sessions unlocked trauma I did not even know I was carrying. The harm-reduction approach let me build momentum instead of feeling like a failure for not being perfect on day one. Two years clean this March, and my family is back in my life.

- Victor L., Auburn, CA

Begin Your Journey to Recovery

Our compassionate team is ready to help you take the first step.