One-year follow-up of subsyndromal gambling disorder in non-treatment-seeking young adults.

BACKGROUND

Subsyndromal gambling disorder (SGD) is prevalent, but little is known regarding its longitudinal course.

METHODS

Individuals with SGD were followed for 1 year. Rate of study retention was determined along with disease status at follow-up. Possible baseline predictors of disease persistence were explored using analysis-of-variance and discriminant function analyses.

RESULTS

Among 157 participants with SGD, 112 (71.3%) were retained at follow-up. Those lost to follow-up showed significantly higher nicotine consumption, gambling severity scores, and frequency of gambling at baseline. Among participants retained for 1 year, 75.9% showed complete remission, 23.2% showed persistence of symptoms, and 0.9% had developed gambling disorder. Those who showed remission gambled significantly lower amounts of money per week. Lower age at entry and greater amounts of money gambled per week were significantly predictive of symptom persistence at 1 year.

CONCLUSIONS

Retention rates were reasonably high (71.3%) in this observational study, suggesting that longitudinal investigation is feasible in people with SGD. Approximately one-quarter of young adults with SGD who were successfully followed for 1 year showed persisting symptoms. Future work should explore the potential predictive value of clinical and cognitive measures in a larger sample over a longer period of time.