Treatment-latency and previous episodes: relationships to pretreatment morbidity and response to maintenance treatment in bipolar I and II disorders.
OBJECTIVE
To clarify relationships of treatment delay and pretreatment episode count with pretreatment morbidity and responses to maintenance treatments in bipolar disorders.


METHODS
In 450 DSM-IV bipolar I (n = 293) or II (n = 157) patients (280 women, 170 men), we evaluated correlations of latency from illness-onset to starting maintenance treatment and pretreatment episode counts with pretreatment morbidity and treatment response. We considered morbidity measures before and during treatment, and their differences.


RESULTS
Latency averaged 7.8 years, with 9.0 episodes per patient, before various maintenance treatments started. Morbidity (percentage of time-ill, episodes per year, first wellness-interval, or proportion of subjects hospitalized or having no recurrences) during maintenance treatment averaging 4.2 years was unrelated to treatment latency or pretreatment episode count. However, pretreatment morbidity was greater with shorter latency, resulting in larger relative reduction of morbidity after earlier treatment.


CONCLUSIONS
Greater treatment latency and pretreatment episode count were not followed by greater morbidity during treatment, although longer delay yielded smaller during-versus-before treatment reduction in morbidity. Predictions that longer treatment delay or more pretreatment episodes lead to poorer responses to various maintenance treatments in bipolar I or II disorder were not supported.
Baldessarini
Ross J
RJ
Consolidated Department of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Belmont, MA, USA. rjb@mclean.org
Tondo
Leonardo
L
Hennen
John
J
D000328:Adult; D017668:Age of Onset; D000928:Antidepressive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use; D018692:Antimanic Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use; D001714:Bipolar Disorder / Q000188:drug therapy*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D018020:Lithium Compounds / Q000627:therapeutic use; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011379:Prognosis; D013997:Time Factors; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D000928:Antidepressive Agents; D018692:Antimanic Agents; D018020:Lithium Compounds