Bipolar disorder is a serious mental illness. People who have it experience dramatic mood swings. They may go from overly energetic, "high" and/or irritable, to sad and hopeless, and then back again. They often have normal moods in between. The up feeling is called mania. The down feeling is depression.
Bipolar disorder can run in families. It usually starts in late adolescence or early adulthood. If you think you may have it, tell your health care provider. A medical checkup can rule out other illnesses that might cause your mood changes.
Untreated, bipolar disorder can result in damaged relationships, poor job or school performance, and even suicide. However, there are effective treatments: medicines and "talk therapy". A combination usually works best.
A recent report demonstrated that there has been a fourty-four percent increase in bi-polar illness among American's children. This is a very worrisome indicator, due to the serious nature of this disease.
What is really frightening is that probably 50% of these cases were mis-diagnosed.
Why frightening? Medications prescribed for adult's diagnosed with this serious disease are given to children. The efficacy or safety of these drugs has never been tested on children. Yet, now they are given potent medications with dangerous side effects, for an illness which may be mis-diagnosed.
Beyond the mis-diagnoses, are the children with true Bi-Polar illness who are given antidepressants, but no mood stabilizer. The outcome is inevitable. They quickly slip into the manic form of this disease, and create havoc. Can you recall a popular prime time show which focused on an older man in the throes of severe depression? He was eventually treated with antidepressants, which caused mania. He became suicidal. By the end of the show, he had thrown himself on the tracks of a rush hour subway, to leave his grieving family shocked by the trauma of this catastrophe.
Results of the study which confirms misdiagnoses and treatment affirm what we are hearing increasingly from families who tell us about disabling, sometimes dangerous psychiatric symptoms in their children. This report reminds us of the need for research that validates the diagnosis of bipolar disorder and other disorders in children and the importance of developing treatments that are safe, effective, and feasible for use in primary care
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