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Dennis McNeilly, Psy.D. |
Currently, no standard drug therapy exists for pathological gambling, but UNMC psychologist, Dennis P. McNeilly, Psy.D., wants to see if a drug used to help alcoholics abstain from drinking also will help pathological gamblers.
Acamprosate, sold under the brand name Campral, is the focus of a clinical trial currently underway at UNMC. The drug is known to block the receptors in the brain that give a pleasurable response to alcohol consumption and diminish the desire to drink. Dr. McNeilly hopes the drug will have the same effect for pathological gamblers.
“We know from neuroimaging studies of pathological gamblers that certain brain mechanisms get shut off as others are triggered when a person gambles,” he said. “Pathological gamblers can crave the excitement or euphoria they get from gambling, much the same as an alcoholic craves drinking. Unfortunately, they also find themselves unable to stop.
“These individuals often arrange their days and lifestyles around gambling and opportunities to gamble.”
Dr. McNeilly and his partners, Martin Wetzel, M.D, assistant professor in the UNMC Department of Psychiatry, and Donald Black M.D., of the University of Iowa Department of Psychiatry, began enrolling study participants in November. They hope to enroll 20 people in the study.
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Dr. McNeilly has conducted studies in persons with pathological gambling since 1998, when he first began to see older adults with gambling problems. A nationally recognized expert and researcher on problem and pathological gambling in older adults, Dr. McNeilly is the president of the National Council on Problem Gambling and was recently appointed by Gov. Dave Heineman to the Nebraska State Committee on Problem Gambling.
For more information about the study, contact the Psychopharmacology Research Consortium at 552-6005.