The 8 Different Types of DepressionMild, Moderate, and Severe Depression. There are many different types of depression. Events in your life cause some and chemical changes in your brain cause others. Your doctor may diagnose major depression if you have five or more of these symptoms most days for 2 weeks or more.
At least one of the symptoms should be a depressed mood or loss of interest in activities. If you have depression that lasts 2 years or more, it's called persistent depressive disorder. This term is used to describe two conditions formerly known as dysthymia (persistent low-grade depression) and chronic major depression. A person with bipolar disorder, which is also sometimes called manic depression, has mood episodes that range from high-energy extremes with a high mood to low depressive periods.
When you're in the low phase, you'll have symptoms of major depression. Traditional antidepressants are not always recommended as first-line treatments for bipolar depression because there is no evidence that these drugs are more useful than a placebo (a sugar pill) for treating depression in people with bipolar disorder. In addition, for a small percentage of people with bipolar disorder, some traditional antidepressants may increase the risk of causing a high phase of the disease or speed up the frequency of having more episodes over time. Seasonal affective disorder is a period of major depression that occurs most often during the winter months, when days get shorter and you get less and less sunlight.
It usually disappears in spring and summer. A combination of antidepressant and antipsychotic drugs can treat psychotic depression. ECT can also be an option. Women who have major depression in the weeks and months after childbirth may have peripartum depression.
About 1 in 10 men also experience depression in the peripartum period. Antidepressant medications may help in a similar way to treating major depression that is not related to childbirth. Sometimes called clinical depression, major depressive disorder (MDD) is a mood disorder in which those affected tend to have depressive symptoms almost all day, almost every day. It's important to note that, like a mental health condition, MDD is not situational.
Even if you have a very full life, with loving relationships and a great career, you can be diagnosed with MDD. Persistent depressive disorder (PTE) was once commonly known as dysthymic disorder. This chronic depression lasts two years or more. It usually won't feel as debilitating as major depressive disorder, but it can still have a big impact on your life, relationships, and daily function.
The severity of PDD can range from mild to moderate to severe depression. Also known as seasonal affective disorder, SAD is clinically known as major depressive disorder (MDD) with a seasonal pattern. People with this seasonal disorder often find that their depression correlates with weather and seasons. It is more common during the winter months, and as the weather improves and spring begins, depressive symptoms may also improve.
Situational depression is clinically known as adjustment disorder with depressed mood. While many of the symptoms may resemble major depressive disorder (MDD), situational depression is different because it occurs and is experienced after a specific, stressful, or life-altering event. People with major depression experience symptoms most of the day, every day. These symptoms can last for weeks or even months.
Some people may have a single episode of major depression, while others experience it throughout their lives. Regardless of how long symptoms last, major depression can cause problems with your relationships and daily activities. Persistent depressive disorder is depression that lasts 2 years or more. People may also refer to this as dysthymia or chronic depression.
Persistent depression may not feel as intense as major depression, but it can still strain relationships and make daily tasks difficult. Persistent depression lasts for years in a row, so people with this type of depression may begin to feel that their symptoms are only part of their normal view of life. Manic depression involves periods of mania or hypomania, in which you feel very happy. These periods alternate with episodes of depression.
Manic depression is an outdated name for bipolar disorder. Hypomania is a less serious form of mania. Some people with major depression may experience periods of psychosis. This may involve hallucinations and delusions.
Medical professionals refer to this as major depressive disorder with psychotic characteristics. However, some providers still refer to this phenomenon as depressive psychosis or psychotic depression. Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) is a severe form of premenstrual syndrome (PMS). While the symptoms of PMS can be both physical and psychological, the symptoms of PMDD tend to be mostly psychological.
These psychological symptoms are more severe than those associated with premenstrual syndrome. For example, some people may feel more emotional in the days before menstruation. However, a person with PMDD may experience a level of depression and sadness that gets in the way of day-to-day functions. Similar to perinatal depression, PMDD may be related to hormonal changes.
Your symptoms often start right after ovulation and begin to subside once you have your period. Some people rule out PMDD as a serious case of PMS, but PMDD can be very serious and can include suicidal thoughts. For most people with seasonal depression, it tends to occur during the winter months. Seasonal depression may worsen as the season progresses and may lead to suicidal thoughts.
Once spring arrives, symptoms tend to improve. This may be related to changes in your body rhythms in response to increased natural light. Situational depression, or adjustment disorder with depressed mood, resembles major depression in many ways. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about 16 million U.S.
adults suffer from depression every year. Although we usually talk about depression as if it were a condition, it is actually a general term that includes many related conditions. It may be helpful to know something about these different subtypes, as they often have different symptoms and require different types of treatment. A single depressive episode is the most common form of depression.
It is usually caused by significant life stress, such as the death of a loved one, a divorce, or the loss of a job. What begins as stress or grief eventually develops into an episode of major depression, lasting from a few weeks to several months. Symptoms include sadness, loss of motivation, hopelessness, fatigue, lack of concentration, aches, sleep disturbances, and thoughts of death or suicide. These symptoms must persist for at least two weeks for depression to be diagnosed.
People who get help for an episode of major depression usually don't experience another episode. If you have had two or three episodes of major depression, it is very likely that it will become recurrent. With recurrent depression and the episode can begin for no particular reason. Usually, these episodes occur regularly, about every 18 months.
A form of psychotherapy called cognitive mindfulness-based therapy or MBCT has been shown to be especially effective for people with recurrent depression. There are several features that make atypical depression atypical. First, positive events can temporarily lift depression, whereas with typical depression, things you would normally enjoy are gray and tasteless like everything else. Atypical depression also increases appetite rather than reduces it, which could lead to weight gain.
The other distinguishing feature of atypical depression is that it tends to cause you to sleep a lot, while depression usually causes insomnia or waking up in the middle of the night. Dysthymia is a long-lasting, low-intensity form of depression. While a normal depressive episode can last several months, dysthymia lasts for two years or more. Although it lasts longer, the symptoms are not as severe.
Instead of feeling really bad for a few weeks or months, people with dysthymia feel really bad for years. In fact, they often forget what it's like to feel good and assume that their slightly depressed mood is normal. There is also a condition called double depression, which is when people with dysthymia have an episode of major depression. A person suffering from double depression needs treatment for both the depressive episode and the underlying dysthymia.
Bipolar disorder is a mood disorder characterized by periods of abnormally elevated mood known as mania. These periods can be mild (hypomania) or they can be so extreme that they cause a marked deterioration in a person's life, require hospitalization, or affect a person's sense of reality. The vast majority of people with bipolar disorder also have episodes of major depression. If you or someone you love is struggling with depression, contact the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) National Helpline at 1-800-662-4357 for information on support and treatment facilities in your area.
Dysthymia, now known as persistent depressive disorder, refers to a type of chronic depression present for more days than not for at least two years. May be mild, moderate or severe 1 According to the National Institute of Mental Health, 1.5% of adults in the United States had persistent depressive disorder in the past year. The disorder affects women (1.9 per cent) more than men (1 per cent), and researchers estimate that about 1.3 per cent of all EE,. Adults will have the disorder at some point in their lives.
Currently classified as peripartum onset depression, postpartum depression (PPD) is more than just “postpartum melancholy.”. If you experience depression, sleepiness, and weight gain during the winter months, but feel perfectly well in spring, you may have a condition known as seasonal affective disorder (SAD) ,1 currently called major depressive disorder with a seasonal pattern. Prevalence rates for SAD can be difficult to determine because the condition is often not diagnosed or reported. It is more common in areas further away from the equator.
For example, estimates suggest that APR affects 1% of Florida's population; that figure rises to 9% in Alaska. Send us a confidential message or call 713-660-1100. Unlike other forms of depression, people with atypical depression may respond better to a type of antidepressant known as a monoamine oxidase inhibitor (MAOI). Careful and skillful screening for a history of hypomania (often supported by key informant interviews) found that the frequency of bipolar II disorder was similar to that of major depressive disorder in both community and outpatient clinical samples.
Depression can occur in many forms, and the type of depression you have, along with the severity you experience, can have a wide range of symptoms and impacts on your life. Psychotic depression is a severe form of depression that can occur in people with unipolar and bipolar depression. This review will focus on new developments in the classification and description of various forms of depression. Although depression can occur in many forms, the following are some of the types that are most commonly experienced.
There is an increased risk of suicide with bipolar disorder, and those who have the most severe form may experience delusions and hallucinations. This is the term used to describe a severe form of depression in which many of the physical symptoms of depression are present. This common form of depression is exceptionally difficult for sufferers because they will have periods when they don't present with symptoms of classic depression. .
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