Identifying Depression Types
Bridges To Recovery released the following report in response to the rising number of depressed Americans in 2009. Their Public Relations team reported that depression types are not all the same. There are five different psychological diagnoses of depression types. Most of these depression types are fairly common and yet often go undiagnosed. Anyone can get depression. People showing symptoms of these depression types seek help from a professional. Depression can be dangerous and have symptoms that can be life threatening if left untreated.
Major depression is the most severe of the depression types. Major depressions can be a one time occurrence or can develop over time, and can be caused by a traumatic experience or can have no cause whatsoever. Major depression can be caused by a medical condition due to brain chemistry, or could be hereditary. These causes are still being studied and not all psychiatrists are on board yet. Major depression is one of the depression types that often go untreated because people feel that they have to be suicidal in order to have major depression, or they are afraid to seek treatment because they fear that they will end up in the hospital. While these are symptoms and results of this depression type for some people, the certainly do not pertain to all. Major depression can be treated with therapy or with medication, and often is treated with a combination of the two.
Dysthymic disorder is chronic depression, or depression that does not go away on its own. The symptoms of dysthymic disorder are not as severe as major depression, but symptoms are present almost every day for at least a year or two. Symptoms for this and other depression types can include fatigue, loss of appetite, loss of sleep, excessive sleep, loss of desire to do things you enjoy, loss of enjoyment when you do them, no energy to do things like clean the house or bathe, and low self-esteem. Some of these symptoms might be less severe or non existent with dysthymic disorder than with other depression types, but patients with dysthymic disorder often complain that they cannot remember a time that they were not depressed.
Unspecified depression, or often simply called depression, is kind of a combination of both of the above depression types. Unspecified depression will typically be more severe than dysthymic disorder but not chronic, and more chronic than major depression but not as severe. These patients are often used to study all of the different depression types and causes.
Reactive depression, or adjustment disorder, is a depression type that is caused by a traumatic experience or life changing event and is of the depression types that is the least diagnosed. If a depression type is unspecified, meaning the psychiatrist is unable to call it major or chronic enough to be dysthymia and the trauma has occurred to cause it, then reactive depression would be diagnosed.
Depression from bipolar disorder can be easily misdiagnosed. Bipolar disorder is a condition in which the patient experiences extreme ups and downs. The downs are what causes this depression type. The reason that it is often missed is because patients rarely complain about the ups until they find that their lifestyle is getting out of hand. Bipolar disorder is often initially diagnosed as major depression and treated with antidepressants, which can make the ups happen more often and cause them to be very severe.