DSM-IV personality disorders in the WHO World Mental Health Surveys.
BACKGROUND
Little is known about the cross-national population prevalence or correlates of personality disorders.


OBJECTIVE
To estimate prevalence and correlates of DSM-IV personality disorder clusters in the World Health Organization World Mental Health (WMH) Surveys.


METHODS
International Personality Disorder Examination (IPDE) screening questions in 13 countries (n = 21 162) were calibrated to masked IPDE clinical diagnoses. Prevalence and correlates were estimated using multiple imputation.


RESULTS
Prevalence estimates are 6.1% (s.e. = 0.3) for any personality disorder and 3.6% (s.e. = 0.3), 1.5% (s.e. = 0.1) and 2.7% (s.e. = 0.2) for Clusters A, B and C respectively. Personality disorders are significantly elevated among males, the previously married (Cluster C), unemployed (Cluster C), the young (Clusters A and B) and the poorly educated. Personality disorders are highly comorbid with Axis I disorders. Impairments associated with personality disorders are only partially explained by comorbidity.


CONCLUSIONS
Personality disorders are relatively common disorders that often co-occur with Axis I disorders and are associated with significant role impairments beyond those due to comorbidity.
Huang
Yueqin
Y
Institute of Mental Health, Peking University, Beijing, China.
Kotov
Roman
R
de Girolamo
Giovanni
G
Preti
Antonio
A
Angermeyer
Matthias
M
Benjet
Corina
C
Demyttenaere
Koen
K
de Graaf
Ron
R
Gureje
Oye
O
Karam
Aimée Nasser
AN
Lee
Sing
S
Lépine
Jean Pierre
JP
Matschinger
Herbert
H
Posada-Villa
José
J
Suliman
Sharain
S
Vilagut
Gemma
G
Kessler
Ronald C
RC
D000367:Age Factors; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D039721:Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010554:Personality Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000208:ethnology; D015995:Prevalence; D012307:Risk Factors; D012737:Sex Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D014478:Unemployment; D014944:World Health Organization