Duration of untreated bipolar disorder: missed opportunities on the long road to optimal treatment.

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Drancourt, Noëmie | Etain, Bruno | Lajnef, Mohamed | Henry, Chantal | Raust, Aurélie | Cochet, Barbara | Mathieu, Flavie | Gard, Sébastien | M'Bailara, Katia | Zanouy, L. | Kahn, Jean-Pierre | Cohen, Renaud, F. | Wajsbrot-Elgrabli, O. | Leboyer, Marion | Scott, J. | Bellivier, Frank

Edité par CCSD ; Wiley -

International audience. OBJECTIVE: Duration of untreated illness represents a potentially modifiable component of any diagnosis-treatment pathway. In bipolar disorder (BD), this concept has rarely been systematically defined or not been applied to large clinically representative samples. METHOD: In a well-characterized sample of 501 patients with BD, we estimated the duration of untreated bipolar disorder (DUB: the interval between the first major mood episode and first treatment with a mood stabilizer). Associations between DUB and clinical onset and the temporal sequence of key clinical milestones were examined. RESULTS: The mean DUB was 9.6 years (SD 9.7; median 6). The median DUB for those with a hypomanic onset (14.5 years) exceeded that for depressive (13 years) and manic onset (8 years). Early onset BD cases have the longest DUB (P < 0.0001). An extended DUB was associated with more mood episodes (P < 0.0001), more suicidal behaviour (P = 0.0003) and a trend towards greater lifetime mood instability (e.g. rapid cycling, possible antidepressant-induced mania). CONCLUSION: Duration of untreated bipolar disorder (DUB) will only be significantly reduced by more aggressive case finding strategies. Reliable diagnosis (especially for BD-II) and/or instigation of recommended treatments is currently delayed by insufficient awareness of the early, polymorphous presentations of BD, lack of systematic screening and/or failure to follow established guidelines.

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