Psychiatric diagnoses in patients with psychogenic dizziness or severe tinnitus

Psychiatric assessments were made of patients with psychogenic dizziness (N = 17) and severe tinnitus (N = 24) using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-III-R (SCID). The psychogenic dizziness group had a high prevalence of psychiatric disorders (100%), the majority being anxiety disorders (94%), particularly diagnoses in the panic-agoraphobic cluster (76%). The severe tinnitus group had a lower prevalence of psychiatric disorders (63%) with a predominance of mood disorders (46%). Those tinnitus patients with no hearing loss tended to have more diagnoses per patient and more anxiety disorders than those with hearing loss. Although this was not a random sampling of these patients populations, the results are of sufficient magnitude to warrant further studies. The implications of the results are discussed in terms of treatment and future research.