Am J Psychiatry 1980; 137:1084-1087
Copyright © 1980 by American Psychiatric Association
A comparison of unipolar and bipolar depressive illness
R Abrams and MA Taylor
In a study of 40 consecutively hospitalized patients with research
diagnoses of endogenous depression, the authors found no difference between
unipolar and bipolar depressive patients in the risk for affective disorder
in first-degree relatives, proportion of EEG or neuropsychological
abnormalities, clinical evidence of the depressive syndrome, or response to
doctor's choice of treatment. Bipolar patients had an earlier age of onset
and displayed more manic symptoms that did unipolar patients. The authors
conclude that the two forms of depressive illness are clinically and
genetically homogeneous, are without identifying EEG or cognitive
differences, and have an equally good response to somatic treatments.
