Differential diagnosis of major depression and bipolar disorder

Excerpt

This issue is dedicated to the differential diagnosis of affective disorders with focus on clinical and neuroimaging markers. From a first view, psychosocial dysfunction is mainly associated with schizophrenia. However, Bottlender et al. [1] analyzed the association between psychosocial function and psychopathology in schizophrenia, schizoaffective and affective disorder. For all diagnostic groups, they found higher levels of psychopathology to be associated with higher levels of psychosocial dysfunction in various domains, highlighting the importance of symptom remission in major psychiatric disorders. Major depression and bipolar disorder are known to have a high heritability. Serretti et al. [2] investigated the impact of a family history on clinical and socio-demographic variables. They found a positive family history more common in bipolar patients than in major depression plus an association with anxiety disorders and age of onset in both diseases. However, hypomania is frequent in patients with major depressive episodes, and the DSM-IV concept of hypomanic episodes should be revised [3]. …