Birches spotlighted in BHB: "Looming Demand for Gambling Disorder Treatment"
Birches Health is featured in a new Behavioral Health Business article that highlights the growing demand for specialized gambling addiction treatment. Andrew DiGiacomo, SVP of Strategy for Birches, was interviewed by Chris Larson for the piece, and shared his view on the rapid expansion and normalization of gambling across the U.S.
“The speed that sports betting and online gambling have just expedited is unbelievable. The other defining feature is that, unlike substance use disorders, gambling disorder doesn’t require detox or med management for the most part — meaning the clinical model looks different, a little bit like the Wild West.”
As gambling continues to become even more accessible in more states, the worry is that the U.S. is facing a potential wave of deadly care outcomes that it is largely not ready to address. People with gambling disorders, both domestically and internationally, bear a disproportionate risk of suicide.
A more recent poll highlights the looming generational shift. Last year, the American Psychiatric Association found that 28% of Americans gamble online daily and that 35% of those aged 18 to 25 did so.
Youssef Kalad, principal at AlleyCorp, whose firm invested in Birches Health, said he sees the proliferation of digital gambling platforms and similar platforms that enable financial speculation as a driver of “individual despair” and that the firm has a mandate to support enterprises that tackle that and similar problems by “rethinking economic infrastructure for families and individuals.”
“So the ‘why now’ is very clear — there was a social trend and a technological trend that we’re meeting,” Kalad said. “What is unique about a potential behavioral health solution in an age when we have really large, scaled-up solutions? It was, I think, obvious from listening to folks who we were meeting in church basements and community centers … and looking at the very specific impact of gambling disorder on people, it was obvious that you couldn’t just treat it through a typical traditional behavioral health platform.”
What’s more, the increased youth of the population of those likely to seek gambling disorder treatment in the future aren’t seen as likely to engage with the traditional care model. The gambling platforms themselves are also a powerful force that may direct people to care as they become more entrenched in American life.
“The amount of ads out there is just skyrocketing for gambling,” DiGiacomo said. “So the market is building itself, and we’re kind of lucky to get on the forefront of that for now.”
Kalad added that it’s a “moral imperative” for state and local governments, as well as gambling and related platforms, to “ensure that you create a menu of offerings of support for your customers and users.”
“We have never been paid by a gambling company for any kind of treatment services,” DiGiacomo said. “We just want to be out there in front of it, in case someone needs that help. That’s our core mission as well. We made sure that we could get out to get insurance and state funding, and that separation is what we can do to make sure to keep that as a clean relationship so we never muddy those waters there.”
READ THE FULL ARTICLE ON BEHAVIORAL HEALTH BUSINESS (Paywall)
