Mental health articles

Bipolar affective disorder or manic depression The term bipolar affective disorder is used for people who experience depressive, manic or mixed episodes (characteristics of depression and mania together) at different times. People usually recover and have a period of stability between episodes. Depressive episodes are far more common and tend to last longer. Manic episodes tend to start quite quickly and are generally shorter. It is very rare for people just to have manic episodes, without an earlier or later depressive episode. John has moderate intellectual disabilities. He lives in a supported house and attends a day centre. Over the past few weeks he has not been sleeping well. He has been restless, not even sitting to eat, but instead grabbing the food in his hands andwolfing it down. He has been irritable and argumentative, and has attempted to take over some of the personal care tasks of the staff with other clients. When asked not to do this he becomes both physically and verbally aggressive, saying he can do the job better than them.

Tags: bipolar affective disorder, manic depression