Bipolar disorder 101- What You Absolutely Need to Know

Introduction
Bipolar disorder, also known as manic-depressive illness, is quite prevalent in USA and the numbers are on a rise with the stressors of life on a rise.

What is bipolar disorder?
Bipolar disorder is a mental illness in whish one faces unpredictable mood swings ranging from depressive symptoms to manic symptoms. It is not necessary that a person has depression to be labeled as bipolar disorder, episodes of mania are sufficient. The most frequent age of onset is between 20 and 30 years but the variations are still present.

What are different types?
There are basically two different types of bipolar disorder type I or type II based on the amount of depressive and manic episodes. For characterizing a person as full-blown mania one should have the symptoms of mania for one week and of depression for two weeks.

How to diagnose Bipolar disorder?
To diagnose bipolar disorder one should have symptoms of mania or symptoms of mania and depression. The symptoms of mania are unrestrained buying sprees, talkativeness, inflated self-esteem, flight of ideas, sleeplessness, distractibility, etc.
To diagnose depression the symptoms are recurrent thoughts of death, insomnia, loss of energy, weight loss, psychomotor agitation, markedly diminished interest, etc.

What are differential diagnoses?
The differential diagnoses are hyperthyroidism, AIDS, Huntington