According to CEO Richard Taite, Cliffside Malibu has treated 2,000 patients as of November 2014 and that the facility has a capacity of approximately 108 beds. According to Taite, between 40 and 45 percent of Cliffside Malibu's patients were addicted to prescription drugs when it opened as a licensed facility in 2005. During a discussion of opiate addiction on a May 2016 episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, Taite stated that the percentage of patients addicted to prescription drugs upon entering Cliffside Malibu had increased to 90 percent. Treatment at Cliffside Malibu is more costly than the average facility. Patients pay up to $80,000 a month for treatment. The center provides organic food and luxury-hotel amenities, including a heated pool and turndown service. Cliffside Malibu director of addiction researchConstance Scharff told Culture Counter Magazine that "the disease of addiction is not different for celebrities, however they are more acutely impacted by substance abuse", and that Cliffside follows the same procedures regardless of the patient. Cliffside Malibu assigns each patient a dedicated therapist to aid in identifying underlying issues that caused their addiction. The facility also uses Orthomolecular medicine, a form of alternative medicine.
Cliffside Malibu and its CEO Richard Taite were mentioned in The Verge after reporting done by that publication in 2017 disclosed that "several popular publications covering addiction and treatment double as marketing operations for treatment centers". The Verge's disclosure included information that two of these publications, The Fix and Rehab Reviews, were owned by Clean and Sober Media, LLC., which in turn is financially controlled by Richard Taite. This relationship had not previously been disclosed in disclaimers by the publications to their readers. Taite's attorney responded in The Verge piece, saying "Any implication that the content of an editorial review, including its aesthetics, is influenced by whether a treatment center has paid for advertising is false." In 2018 it was reported that Cliffside Malibu and Center for Discovery, which is owned by private equity firm Webster Capital, were merging to become Discovery Behavioral Health. According to the Institute for the Advancement of Behavioral Healthcare, "Clean and Sober Media was not part of the Webster Capital transaction."
