Gambling Disorder: Ethics and Treatment

Course overview

Never has there been such expansion of legalized gambling in the United States as there has been in the past 5 years. Yet, this expansion has not been accompanied by the same rate of growth in services as has occurred for mental health and addiction treatment or prevention. Mental health providers do not receive adequate training in gambling disorders in their graduate programs and are likely to be unprepared to provide gambling disorder treatment when they enter the field. This course provides education in multiple areas related to the identification and treatment of gambling and gambling disorders. The purpose of this course is to prepare social workers, psychologists, marriage and family therapists, and counselors to identify signs and symptoms of gambling disorders and any ethical standards that apply in clinical practice. When working with clients with gambling disorder, clinicians may perceive some situations as ethical dilemmas when in fact they are clinical challenges. Once identified as such, clinical challenges can often have a direct set of steps to follow. Case examples presented in this learning material therefore focus on both ethical considerations and clinical challenges and include possible resolutions to these issues when working with clients with disordered gambling. These case examples consider ethical and clinical practices that can resolve common concerns for clinicians who are treating problematic gambling.