KEY POINTS:
Many gambling addicts are waiting until their habit creates a crisis before seeking help, a study has found.
It was not until they reached financial disaster and psychological distress that many problem gamblers sought help, it said.
By that time, they often found that help to be ineffective.
The gamblers were paralysed by fear of public stigma and shame, and also battled their own guilt, procrastination and attitudes, the Auckland University of Technology study said.
Pride and denying they had a problem were also factors.
Crises cited included the belief they had nowhere else to go, had run out of options or were broke. One example was of a couple who had been forced to sell their house and furniture to pay for the husband's gambling.
The two-year study, the first of its kind in New Zealand, was prepared by a team headed by AUT's Dr Maria Bellringer and found those seeking help had often tried and failed to sort out their addiction and had asked for help as a final step.
Knowledge of the help available to problem gamblers was poor, the treatment process was not well understood, and people who had previously sought specialist assistance often reported a negative experience.
Problem gamblers often said mental health professionals and GPs were unhelpful, "possibly because of their attitudes towards addiction and lack of training in dealing with addictions".
It was important those people were persuaded to change their view that addictions were merely self-control problems and not medical or psychiatric ones.
The study's major recommendation was to encourage problem gamblers to seek help before a crisis was reached. It suggested increasing the awareness of problem gambling, making seeking help a more normal activity, and raising awareness of available support.
It also suggested the range and access to support be improved, and those supports be better designed.
That would require "robust evaluation" of the specialist and non-specialist supports.
"It shows we need to be encouraging gamblers to go for help earlier in their journey," Dr Bellringer said. "There are many people out there still suffering who haven't yet reached a traumatic or critical point, or are flying under the radar of raising major concerns."
There was also a need to raise awareness among family, friends and non-specialist health professionals, including GPs, psychiatrists and mental health professionals, she said, "so they can encourage people to seek help earlier, before a crisis point".
Nearly 300 people participated in the study, which included focus groups and in-depth individual interviews.
Each problem gambler was likely to directly affect at least five other people, the study said.
Only one in 10 problem gamblers was thought to have sought help.
