Business

From Shannon Taler AND Ariel Zilber

July 11, 2023 | 3.15pm

A Manhattan psychiatrist whose clientele includes Wall Street traders, investment bankers and corporate lawyers said there has been an explosion in the number of patients seeking treatment for drugs, alcohol, depression and other health problems mental.

Dr. Sam Glazer, who heads an Upper East Side-based therapy practice, told The Wall Street Journal that he has seen the surge since the pandemic despite the previous stigma attached by finance professionals fearful of taking time off because they don’t want the their customers to get wind of any problems.

I’ve seen many high-functioning people in the upper echelons of finance who are terrified of exposure, said Glazer, 56.

There is a culture of paranoia. Would you like someone to handle your money who is an identified alcoholic? he added of his patients, which include traders, fund managers, investment bankers and corporate lawyers.

Glazer told the Journal that his practice has grown exponentially during the pandemic, forcing him to hire four new therapists to keep up with demand caused by the high-stress nature of Wall Street.

Businesses located in the Financial District have long required employees to work brutal, 105-hour workweeks, which have been the catalyst for multiple tragedies over the years, including the shocking suicide of billionaire financier Thomas H. Lee in February.

Lee, known as the envy of Wall Street, was found in his office bathroom with a single gunshot wound to the head next to his Smith & Wesson revolver.

The 78-year-old philanthropist was discovered by a female assistant on the bathroom floor in his family office at the Fifth Avenue headquarters of his namesake finance firm, police sources told The Post earlier this year.

To cope with depression, stress and burnout syndrome, other wealthy stock traders have reportedly flocked to a Manhattan-based ketamine therapy studio that dispenses the hallucinogenic drug via drip in palatial surroundings for $750 per session.

Jeff Ditzell psychiatric center in the Financial District legally doses patients with the drug best known as a psychedelic party favor Ditzell told The Post late last year.

We see a lot of Wall Street traders, Ditzell said, adding that 30% to 40% of his clients work in the financial sector. You could tell they are coming in droves. It’s a very stressful job and these humans are performance driven.

Big banks have rolled out initiatives to address mental health in recent years, including JPMorgan, which broke new ground when it launched a new unit with $250 million in funding targeting health care.

The unit, called Morgan Health, has created an improved model of employer-sponsored health care, according to the Journal, with the goal of improving mental health care services for workers.

In 2021, Bank of America announced that it has committed $1.35 million to support multiple mental health initiatives in partnership with One Mind, RADical Hope, and the National Alliance of Mental Illness organizations.

However, private equity firms and hedge funds that pride themselves on being even more competitive and offering higher salaries have been slower to take steps to support the mental health of their employees, the Journal reported.