What is the difference between Bipolar and Bipolar Effective?!
Question: My Psychiatrist thought I might of had bipolar so refered me to a clinic that deals with bipolar, that he also works at so I didnt have to change people.
We Went through the checklist of symptoms etc to help with a diagnosis, and while we found I had most of the symptoms, but the highs didn't last long enough and something else meant that we couldn't give a definitive diagnosis.
A Couple of weeks later however, on my Centrelink Medical Certificate he listed Bipolar Effective, and has since put that down as my official diagnosis. What does it mean?
Answers: My Psychiatrist thought I might of had bipolar so refered me to a clinic that deals with bipolar, that he also works at so I didnt have to change people.
We Went through the checklist of symptoms etc to help with a diagnosis, and while we found I had most of the symptoms, but the highs didn't last long enough and something else meant that we couldn't give a definitive diagnosis.
A Couple of weeks later however, on my Centrelink Medical Certificate he listed Bipolar Effective, and has since put that down as my official diagnosis. What does it mean?
The term is "Bipolar Affective Disorder", and it's just an older phrasing of Bipolar Disorder. "Affective" is a word sometimes added to mood disorders, to emphasize that the disorder primarily interferes with "affect" (emotion or mood).
For example, there is an illness called Schizoaffective Disorder, which indicates that there are components of both schizophrenia and mood disorders. But in the case of Bipolar Disorder, we already know that it's a mood disorder, so we drop the "affective" part of the name.
I think "effective" added to it means that it's too soon to really label you as bipolar.
Do you have the spelling right? As already posted, Bipolar Disorder is also referred to as Bipolar Affective Disorder. Affective recognizing that the illness effects mood/disposition/cognition/etc. If it's definitely spelled with an "E" I think that you're going to have to ask.