Depression

A patient can be diagnosed with bi polar disorder after experiencing either a manic episode or a depressive one. The popularized media image wherein bi polar disorder is often shown as someone who is happy one minute and sad the next is totally unfair and lacking in scientific evidence. For the sake of definition, a bi polar disorder is characterized by either a manic episode, where in the patient feels abnormally euphoric without the use of stimulants, medical or organic. It is also characterized by constant and heavy episodes of unexplained depression.

Other than the use of blood pressure medicines and other steroidal medications that can mimic the endogenous depression always present in bi polar disorder, there is also REM sleep loss in patients with this disorder. There are a number of causal hypotheses which correlated endogenous depression to bi polar disorder and bi polar disorder to filial ties. One is the twin and adoption study which strongly suggests that there is a genetic causal correlation in many cases of bi polar disorder. The details of the case will be discussed shortly.

First, it is necessary to understand the roots of bi polar disorder. Although nothing is finalized yet, there is a study which looked into bi polar disorder in twin and adoption circumstances. This study gave promising results. These studies say that there is strong suggestive, but not absolute, evidence that mania, endogenous depression, alcoholism and sociopathy have such a filial component. Most psychiatric conditions, as we as most illnesses in general, run in families and are more common in monozygotic or dizygotic (identical and fraternal, respectively) twins. With the use of DNA recombination techniques, researchers were able to finally conclude that abnormalities causing bi polar disorder are in the genes.

The twin and adoption study was done with an Old Order Amish family. In this study, a monozygotic or identical set of twins were separated at birth. One remained with the Amish family and the other was sent to an average American home. The twins had different friends, enjoyed different things and had different view in life, and different educations. However, both twins are monitored to not have any experience of trauma such as spanking or sexual advancements. Both were allowed to date and experience the normal life of a teen in their environments. Later on, both twins were diagnosed with bi polar disorder although one was diagnosed before the other. This greatly eliminates the suggestion that bi polar disorder is a disorder caused by external causes.

Understanding bi polar disorder will be a long and slow journey. Discoveries in bi polar disorder, as with other mental disorders are long and far in between. However, studies are still ongoing. Cures or therapy is starting to become safer and more widely available for patients with bi polar disorder. With medical attention, bi polar disorder will not be a hindrance to a patient’s life. However, it goes without saying that a good patient-doctor relationship is one of the ways to survive the troublesome life of a patient with bi polar disorder.