Researchers Point to Overdiagnosis of Bipolar Disorder

Several studies have found that Bipolar Disorder is being overdiagnosed.

A study conducted at Brown University School of Medicine in the state of Rhode Island suggests that about 50% of diagnosed cases of Bipolar Disorder may be mistaken.. 

The Overdiagnosis of Bipolar Disorder

This report is one of the latest to emerge from Brown University, in the United States, with the aim of optimizing the diagnostic evaluationIt represents a common front of collaborations between academic researchers and psychiatric health care personnel. The study was conducted on the basis of interviews with 800 psychiatric patients using a comprehensive diagnostic test, the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM Disorders. Respondents also answered a questionnaire in which they had to specify whether they had been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder or Manic-Depressive Disorder.

146 of these patients indicated that they had previously been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. However, the researchers found that only 64 of the patients had Bipolar Disorder based on their own diagnoses using the SCID test.

Controversy: overdiagnosis under scrutiny

Researchers have put forward several explanatory hypotheses for these surprising results, which suggest an overdiagnosis of cases of Bipolar Disorder. Among them, speculate with a greater propensity of specialists to diagnose TB as opposed to other more stigmatizing disorders for which there is no treatment. and for which there is no clear treatment. Another explanatory theory attributes responsibility for overdiagnosis to aggressive advertising of the drugs used in treatment by pharmaceutical companies. Many professionals and scientists have recently highlighted that adhd may also be being overdiagnosed.

Researchers insist on the need to use standardized and validated methods such as SCID for obtaining reliable diagnoses.

Bibliographic references:

• Zimmerman M., (2008) Is bipolar disorder overdiagnosed? Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.