Phone-Based Councelling Service is Here to Help
4th December, 2007
The National Council on Problem Gambling (NCPG) in Singapore has decided to team up with the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) to combine the skills and resources to be able to improve the problem gambling helplines. Aside from the usual helpline service they will now also offer phone-based counseling services.
The new service started operating on the first date of this month with counselors from IMH’s Community Addiction Management Programme working behind the phones.
When callers contact the service, they first get reviewed by the usual help advisers. In cases where the follow-up is needed, as considered by the help advisers, the callers will get referred to an NCPG-designated help centre.
This is a reflection of the ongoing work by council and IMH that has started in 2005 specifically to assist problem gamblers and everyone who gets affected by it, like the families of compulsive gamblers, for instance.
NCPG stated that the success of such helplines is evident from the example of Thye Hua Kwan Moral Society and the Care Corner Counselling Centre operating helplines, such as this. They received 800 calls just in 2006.
