Psychiatric comorbidity and quality of life in patients with bipolar disorder

Psychiatric comorbidity in patients with bipolar disorder (BD) has been associated with an earlier onset, rapid cycling, worsening severity and outcome, and increased suicidality. Patients with BD have been reported to have poor quality of life (QOL) even during remission.

Estimate the prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity and assess the QOL in patients with BD, and find the associated sociodemographic and clinical variables.

This cross-sectional study was done in a general hospital psychiatric unit on 100 patients (both inpatients and outpatients) with DSM-IV-TR BD in partial or complete remission. Patients were assessed using a semi-structured pro forma, Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview 6.0 - Hindi version, Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression or Young Mania Rating Scale and World Health Organization QOL instrument, short-form (WHOQOL-BREF), Hindi Version.

Sixty-one percent of the sample had at least one psychiatric comorbidity, and the commonest comorbid disorders were substance use disorders (SUD) (30%) and anxiety disorders (AD) (28%). Male gender was identified as a predictor for comorbidity in BD. The mean QOL-BREF score was 85.96 ± 14.35. Poor QOL was associated with older age at onset of comorbidity, multiple comorbidities, mixed episodes, rapid cycling, partial remission, and increased severity of depression while patients with current hypomanic symptoms were found to have better QOL. BD with comorbidity had worse QOL than those without comorbidity.

The majority of patients with BD had at least one comorbidity. SUD were the most common comorbid disorders. QOL, already poor in BD patients, was poorer in cases with comorbidity.