Bipolar disorder is a disease that alters the brain systems that regulate the patient’s mood. This affectation causes episodes of depression and euphoria (the episodes of euphoria are called mania or hypomania according to their intensity).
It is a chronic and recurrent disease, so preventive treatment is necessary to avoid the appearance of new episodes, which are known as phases, and which tend to continue to occur. Between each phase, the psychological stability of the person is total, so that recovery seems evident. Depending on the patient, the disease and the treatment received, these periods of stability can be short or very long, even years. The most classic form of this illness, known as bipolar I disorder, affects slightly less than 2% of the population.
Causes of bipolar disorder
Although the cause of this disease is currently unknown, it is known that the origin of bipolar disorder is fundamentally biological. And within the biological causes, the genetic ones could be the most important. It is quite possible that a certain predisposition to suffer from the disease is inherited. There are also factors that can also be triggers of the phases. Among these factors are the consumption of toxic substances, stress or lack of sleep, among others.
What are the symptoms?
Bipolar disorder does not only manifest itself in more or less abrupt changes in the patient’s mood. To diagnose the disease with certainty, the specialist in Psychiatry must know that the patient has really suffered episodes of sadness and euphoria of sufficient intensity and duration to speak of phases of depression and mania; and bipolar disorder can only be diagnosed if one or more phases of mania have appeared. By mania it is understood that there is a period of time in which the patient is continuously euphoric or irritable, to which can be added an accelerated language, hyperactivity, reduced hours of sleep or megalomaniacal thoughts, for example.
Treatments for bipolar disorder
There are two main types of treatment for bipolar disorder. On the one hand, that of the phases, once depression and mania have appeared, and on the other hand, the maintenance treatment of the disease to prevent new phases from appearing. This type of treatments that prevent the onset of new episodes are called mood stabilizers. There are basically three types: lithium salts, some antiepileptic drugs and some antipsychotic drugs. The specialist must be especially careful in the treatment of episodes of depression and euphoria, because the psychotropic drugs used can generate affective instability, facilitating the appearance of new phases.
For more information on bipolar disorder, consult a specialist in Psychiatry.