Understanding Bipolar Disorder: Symptoms, Causes, And Treatment Essay.

The Different Phases of Bipolar Disorder

The paper is going to discuss about the bipolar disorder and its different phases. The bipolar disorder is one kind of mental illness that causes mood fluctuations to the people suffering with the disease. It is consists of three episodes like the mania episode, hypo mania episode and the depressive episode.

The paper is also going to discuss the various types of signs and symptoms of the disorder like tendency for suicide, sleep deprivation, loss of appetite, loss of concentration and interests. Furthermore, the paper is also going to discuss various causes like the genetic and environmental causes, diagnosis for several types of internal and external factors and preventive measures like prescribing lithium, antidepressants, and mood stabilizers by the doctors which, if taken at the right time, can be helpful in treating with the bipolar disorder.

As per Rowland and Marwaha, (2018), bipolar disorder, also known as bipolar affective disorder, is one type of mood disorder which has been characterized as one of the periods of depression. The distortion of mood can last from few days to few weeks each time it triggers. The severe elevation of mood which is associated to psychosis is known as hypomania, whereas the less severe elevation of mood is known as hypomania. According to Miller and Black, (2020), the medical science still not have been able to come to terms to give a verdict on the causes of this disorder, but it is evident that both the environmental as well as the genetic factors have enough contribution in its occurrences. Till now, it has occurred in not more than one 1 per cent of the population across the globe, accounting around 3 per cent population in America. It is considered to be one of the 20 causes that are responsible for creating disabilities across the world and hinders the development of the society. The side effects to drugs of bipolar disorder and due to the lifestyle choices people make, the death rate accounting to natural causes like heart diseases along with the symptoms of bipolar disorder is double than the people whose death rate is due natural causes only (Ching et al., 2022).

Bipolar disorder is mostly seen in people belonging to the age group of late adolescence as well as people from the early adulthood. People suffering from the disease go through few intermittent episodes like mania, and depression. During these times, they showcase fluctuation in mood, psychomotor activities like slowing down of regular activities (Gordovez and McMahon, 2020).

A person shows symptoms of psychosis, in which the thought processes are affected by the mood disorder. The symptoms are increased in energy, pressured and continuous speech which is difficult to even interrupt, nearly no sleep, overly increase in goal related work, excessive spend on things and hyper sexuality. If this is not treated well, it may lead to more than six months of such behaviour and may even be taken to psychiatric hospital (Abdel-Basset et al., 2019).

It is generally less severe than the episode of mania. In this episode, people suffer an overall increase in regular functioning of daily life, but not in the full fledged manner like mania. They may show some irritation, passing of poor judgement, less sleep. People who have suffered this episode often call it painful even though, this phase of bipolar disorder is a lot controllable and less volatile, if treated with care. The duration of hypo mania lasts not more than few weeks to months (Yatham et al., 2018).

Signs and Symptoms of Bipolar Disorder

The symptoms of this phase are severe sadness, anger, little to no interest in things, feeling of guilt, too much of sleep or no sleep at all, loss or gain of weight, feeling of no self worth, suicidal, loss of concentration. It is highly recommended for someone who suffers this kind of symptoms of depression to immediately seek help medically because it may cause major serious problems in the later part (López-Muñoz et al., 2018).

The causes related to the bipolar disorder are different from one individual to the other. The reasons behind the disease has not yet been understood fully by the medical practitioners but it is believed that the genetic and the environmental causes are the main role players in this regard, with the influence of genetics being nearly 90 per cent of the cases (Wolfers et al., 2018).

It has been identified that certain chromosomal disorders and candidate genes in human beings have been the cause of bipolar disorder that exerts effect on the behavioural pattern of the human beings moderately. It comes from the family line genes as well who have suffered bipolar disorder in the past. The link of genes in the cause of this disorder had been discovered in 1969, but it had been discontinuous since then. As per Miklowitz et al., (2021), though the genome associated study regarding bipolar disorder had been stopped, several studies related to the analysis of biological pathways have been undertaken. The genetic caused bipolar disorder in people are related to reduced functioning of specific enzymes of DNA repair as well as initiates the increase in the level of DNA damage related oxidative.

It plays a significant and important role regarding the causes as well as the development of the phases of bipolar disorder. The recent events and occurrences taking place in life and the personal relationships and equations with people may have an adverse effect on the mental well being of a person. Many studies have claimed that nearly 50 per cent of the people who have suffered traumatic as well as abusive childhood and those person, later in their life, had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

The treatment or the diagnosis of bipolar treatment is basically dependent on the experiences suffered by one individual and the amount of intensity it had over the individual. It is also based on the experiences faced by the individual’s family members, colleagues, friends, acquaintances, or any person who has lived with the patient for the time being. After the treatment is done, daily assessment of the patient is recorded by the care taker. Though the diagnosis of children and elderly people are a lot different from each other in practice because when a child suffer from a mental illness like bipolar disorder, he or she requires extra care from the doctors, care takers and the family members as well.

The bipolar disorder in children and adolescents of America has increased four times in the last ten years, accounting to up to 40 per cent of the total number of children suffering from the disease across the globe. It was a controversial matter to come up with the diagnosis of the children with bipolar disorder, but since it has become quite frequent in the recent times, so the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) has put forward a system of diagnosis which covers stabilizing the mood disruption of children suffering from bipolar disorder (Fries et al., 2019).

Causes of Bipolar Disorder

Most of the time, the older patient do not suffer from bipolar disorder, although they make up to nearly 10 per cent of the total patient suffering from the disease across the world. Mostly the depressive episode with seen in the elder people, accompanied by irregular sleep. Tiredness, fatigue, mood fluctuation, poor concentration, hopelessness and loss of memory are detected among elderly people. The treatment involves immediate care by the doctor, getting admitted to hospital at times if required (Fries, 2019).

It helps to assist someone going through bipolar disorder by understanding, observing and accepting the diagnosis. It aims to check what kind of stress a person has gone through before he or she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It also tries to improve their personal relationship and connection as well (Fries, 2019).

It differs from one person to the other depending on the type of bipolar disorder they face. Lithium has been identified as an effective diagnosis of stress, suicide, self harm, mania, depression, and other phases. Mood stabilizers and antidepressants like aripiprazole have also been used by doctors in treatment, though it comes along with the risks for side effects too (Jawad et al., 2018).

Conclusion 

The bipolar disorder is a kind of mental illness that creates mood disorder in the people suffering from it. It is consist of three phases or episodes, namely mania, hypo mania, and depressive episode. Among these, the depressive episode is the most critical one and it requires immediate involvement by the doctors. The signs and symptoms of the three episodes are more or less similar to each other but differ in the intensity of occurring, like sleep deprivation, loss of appetite, fatigue, tiredness, loss of concentration and interest, etc. The causes depend on the person to person. However, the genetic and the environmental causes are the main ones. Though such diagnosis have not been invented yet but medicines like antidepressants, mood stabilizers are prescribed by the doctor along with extra care by the family members and surrounding.

References 

Rowland, T. A., & Marwaha, S. (2018). Epidemiology and risk factors for bipolar disorder. Therapeutic advances in psychopharmacology, 8(9), 251-269. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2045125318769235

Miller, J. N., & Black, D. W. (2020). Bipolar disorder and suicide: a review. Current psychiatry reports, 22(2), 1-10. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Donald-Black/publication/338676173_Bipolar_Disorder_and_Suicide_a_Review/links/5ea0571b92851c0105780347/Bipolar-Disorder-and-Suicide-a-Review.pdf

Ching, C. R., Hibar, D. P., Gurholt, T. P., Nunes, A., Thomopoulos, S. I., Abé, C., ... & ENIGMA Bipolar Disorder Working Group. (2022). What we learn about bipolar disorder from large?scale neuroimaging: findings and future directions from the ENIGMA Bipolar Disorder Working Group. Human brain mapping, 43(1), 56-82. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1002/hbm.25098

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