Compulsive Gambling Competes with Alcohol, Tobacco and other Drugs as America’s Addiction Choice in the New Millennium
LANSING...Americans are not known for their moderation. As a society, we eat too much, drink too much and work longer hours than those in any other nation in the Western world.
So it hardly came as a surprise that one in ten of us has some kind of an addiction disorder, according to a study published in the August issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Traditionally, when we think of addiction, most of us link this to alcohol or other drugs, but in recent years doctors have pointed out that obesity is rampant in our society, at all age levels.
Will overeating become the chief challenge for medical science in this new millennium?
It may turn out that way, but compulsive gambling is also emerging as the addiction of choice, as state after state relaxes anti-gambling laws in a never-ending search for new revenues to pay for government programs.
New Hampshire opened the door for America's mad rush to legalize gambling in 1964 when state residents approved the nation's first modern-day state lottery. Other states soon followed, but the push to relax anti-gambling laws got a major boost when New Jersey joined Nevada twenty years later in legalizing casinos.
Then when the courts ruled that local laws could not ban casinos on Indian reservations, legalized gambling took a giant step forward. But when Pennsylvania lawmakers approved licensing of slot machines at 61,000 locations across the state, it appeared as though there was no stopping.
Here in Michigan, revenue from state lottery has become an essential element in balancing the state budge, along with taxes from three Detroit casinos and nineteen casinos on Indian reservations throughout the Upper and Lower Peninsulas. Add to that the availability of keno in bars and taverns across the state and Michigan is indeed in the contest to become the nation's gambling capital.
When Michigan horse tracks moved to acquire slot machines, turning their sites into "Racinos," it inspired a political cartoon, suggesting that the state may as well go all the way increasing the availability of slot machines, by installing them in restrooms as "Urinos."
Just as it appeared Michigan had totally lost control of gambling, opponents gathered nearly a half million signatures to place a proposal on the November ballot requiring voter approval for any new gambling in the state.
While there is abundant data to document the incidence of addiction to alcohol and other drugs, such figures are hard to find when it comes to gambling problems. However, Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska recently released a study that found bankruptcy rates are twice as high in counties with gambling casinos than in those without.
The relationship between gambling addiction and addiction to alcohol was first documented in a study conducted at the federal correctional facility in Danbury, Connecticut in the early 1990s. Treatment professionals were impressed by the number of prisoners at their alcohol unit who turned out to have problems with gambling as well.
Then at a Veteran's Administration Hospital where patients were being treated for pathological gambling, researchers found that 47% met the criteria for alcohol or other drug addiction at some point in their life. The researchers also found that alcoholics who gambled were more likely to relapse. Gambling did not replace alcohol abuse, but merely joined it.
Dr. Sheila Blume pioneered the effort to test compulsive gambling by developing a program at South Oaks Hospital where she was medical director for alcoholism, drug addiction and compulsive gambling, using the same addiction model for gambling addiction as for alcohol and other drugs.
It wasn't until 1980 that physicians were provided criteria for diagnosis of compulsive gambling in DSM III. Revised in 1987, the criteria are now almost parallel to the criteria for diagnosing alcohol and other drug dependence.
According to survey data, somewhere between three and five percent of the U.S. population can be classified as compulsive gamblers. Henry Lesieur worked with Dr. Sheila Blume and the South Oaks professional staff in a research project that resulted in the South Oaks Gambling Screen, SOGS, which is included with this issue of Monday Morning Report.
Those concerned with alcohol and other drug problems should be aware of the relationships of these addictions to compulsive gambling, and the SOGS should be helpful in this regard.
MICAP RECAP, Page 1-2, September 15, 2004
So it hardly came as a surprise that one in ten of us has some kind of an addiction disorder, according to a study published in the August issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Traditionally, when we think of addiction, most of us link this to alcohol or other drugs, but in recent years doctors have pointed out that obesity is rampant in our society, at all age levels.
Will overeating become the chief challenge for medical science in this new millennium?
It may turn out that way, but compulsive gambling is also emerging as the addiction of choice, as state after state relaxes anti-gambling laws in a never-ending search for new revenues to pay for government programs.
New Hampshire opened the door for America's mad rush to legalize gambling in 1964 when state residents approved the nation's first modern-day state lottery. Other states soon followed, but the push to relax anti-gambling laws got a major boost when New Jersey joined Nevada twenty years later in legalizing casinos.
Then when the courts ruled that local laws could not ban casinos on Indian reservations, legalized gambling took a giant step forward. But when Pennsylvania lawmakers approved licensing of slot machines at 61,000 locations across the state, it appeared as though there was no stopping.
Here in Michigan, revenue from state lottery has become an essential element in balancing the state budge, along with taxes from three Detroit casinos and nineteen casinos on Indian reservations throughout the Upper and Lower Peninsulas. Add to that the availability of keno in bars and taverns across the state and Michigan is indeed in the contest to become the nation's gambling capital.
When Michigan horse tracks moved to acquire slot machines, turning their sites into "Racinos," it inspired a political cartoon, suggesting that the state may as well go all the way increasing the availability of slot machines, by installing them in restrooms as "Urinos."
Just as it appeared Michigan had totally lost control of gambling, opponents gathered nearly a half million signatures to place a proposal on the November ballot requiring voter approval for any new gambling in the state.
While there is abundant data to document the incidence of addiction to alcohol and other drugs, such figures are hard to find when it comes to gambling problems. However, Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska recently released a study that found bankruptcy rates are twice as high in counties with gambling casinos than in those without.
The relationship between gambling addiction and addiction to alcohol was first documented in a study conducted at the federal correctional facility in Danbury, Connecticut in the early 1990s. Treatment professionals were impressed by the number of prisoners at their alcohol unit who turned out to have problems with gambling as well.
Then at a Veteran's Administration Hospital where patients were being treated for pathological gambling, researchers found that 47% met the criteria for alcohol or other drug addiction at some point in their life. The researchers also found that alcoholics who gambled were more likely to relapse. Gambling did not replace alcohol abuse, but merely joined it.
Dr. Sheila Blume pioneered the effort to test compulsive gambling by developing a program at South Oaks Hospital where she was medical director for alcoholism, drug addiction and compulsive gambling, using the same addiction model for gambling addiction as for alcohol and other drugs.
It wasn't until 1980 that physicians were provided criteria for diagnosis of compulsive gambling in DSM III. Revised in 1987, the criteria are now almost parallel to the criteria for diagnosing alcohol and other drug dependence.
According to survey data, somewhere between three and five percent of the U.S. population can be classified as compulsive gamblers. Henry Lesieur worked with Dr. Sheila Blume and the South Oaks professional staff in a research project that resulted in the South Oaks Gambling Screen, SOGS, which is included with this issue of Monday Morning Report.
Those concerned with alcohol and other drug problems should be aware of the relationships of these addictions to compulsive gambling, and the SOGS should be helpful in this regard.
MICAP RECAP, Page 1-2, September 15, 2004
