DOI: https://doi.org/10.36347/sjmcr.2024.v12i08.028

Pages: 1468-1472

Lotteries, sports betting, slot machines, card games, dice games, horse betting, and many others refer to leisure activities where participants wager money or other valuable assets on uncertain outcomes in the hope of winning additional rewards. These games typically rely on chance and involve risk, where participants make decisions based on probabilities and predictions without certainty about the final result. Gambling ranges from recreational gambling, where participants engage occasionally, lightly, and in a controlled manner, generally for fun and entertainment without harmful consequences to themselves or others, to pathological gambling, where the participant feels an uncontrollable urge to gamble despite negative consequences. This falls under impulse control disorders and can lead to psychological, financial, familial, and social problems. We propose a semiological analysis of two patients hospitalized for complications of pathological gambling, the first for a suicidal equivalent in a depressive context and the second for a conversion disorder, both following significant financial losses. This analysis highlights predisposing factors, psychiatric comorbidities, and the various dimensions of pathological gambling, emphasizing the inadequacy of therapeutic approaches (medication/psychotherapy) that need to be supplemented with other social and legal measures.