Methamphetamine Use and Gambling, July 2020

Funding for this project is provided by the NSW Office of Responsible Gambling
This webinar will examine a topic that we have received many questions about over the years- namely methamphetamine use (including drugs such as “ice” and “speed”) and its relationship with gambling. In a panel session moderated by one of our psychologists, Kerrie Macalister, we will be hosting Dr Vicki Giannopoulos, a senior clinical psychologist from the Sydney Local Health District Drug Health Service, who will be speaking on the impact that methamphetamine use has on the brain, how it presents clinically, and what treatment options are available. We will also be hearing from our own Dr Christopher Hunt, who will be discussing the research on the link between gambling and stimulant drug use, and his own clinical experience working with comorbid gambling and drug use.
Panellist Biographies
Vicki Giannopoulos is a Senior Clinical Psychologist from Sydney Local Health District, Drug Health Service. Vicki has 20 years experience as a clinical psychologist in the addictions field since graduating with a Masters in Clinical Psychology (Sydney University) in 1998. Vicki completed her PhD in the field of assessing partner/family support in clients with substance use disorders who are at risk of suicide (Sydney University, Faculty of Medicine, 2013). Vicki has 20 years experience conducting clinical work, offering clinical supervision, providing education and conducting research in the field of addictions and mental health, including suicide. Vicki has been involved in a number of randomised controlled trials examining treatment for addictions and translational research in comorbid mental health and substance use.
Christopher Hunt is a Clinical Psychologist and the Senior Clinical Supervisor at the Gambling Treatment and Research Clinic at the University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre. Dr Hunt has been working at the clinic for 13 years, and has extensive experience with a range of different psychological therapies for problem gambling. He obtained his PhD in the social psychology of gambling, and had published works in this area, as well as on the relationship between gender and gambling, and on the clinical presentation of gambling disorder. He is currently the chief investigator of a trial comparing self-directed online therapy for gambling with traditional face-to-face treatment options.
Kerrie Macalister is Psychologist who has been working at the Gambling Treatment and Research Clinic at the University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre Since 2016. As well as providing treatment to problem gamblers and their affected loved ones, she also head’s up the clinic’s outreach programme to ingenious communities in the Western Sydney area.