More and more people are being diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which affects 2.6 percent of all American adults. This diagnosis can be scary for patients and their loved ones, but new medications, therapies, and lifestyle changes have transformed treatment and benefited patients. With this health guide, you'll find authoritative, reassuring advice on topics like:The causes of bipolar disorder Common side effects to medications Alternative and nontraditional approaches Mania and manic episodes Links between bipolar and other disordersThis completely revised and updated edition includes the latest treatment options as well as recent studies and classifications. Bipolar disorder is a complex diagnosis. With this positive, supportive guide, you'll find the answers to all your questions--even the ones you haven't thought to ask.

Dean Haycock, PhD earned a fellowship from the National Institute of Mental Health to study at The Rockefeller University. The results of his research, conducted in academia and in the pharmaceutical industry, have been published in the Journals of Neurochemistry, Biological Chemistry, and Brain Research. He has contributed articles on a variety of topics to The Gate Encyclopedia of Mental Health, and resides in Salem, NY. Sheldon Whitten-Vile, MD earned his MD from the University of Kansas. He completed his internship and residency at the University of California in San Francisco, where he stayed on as clinical faculty until 1994. He has served as Medical Director of the Bert Nash Mental Health Center in Lawrence, Kansas, and Medical Director of Marin County Mental Health Services in California. He is coauthor of the Mood Disorders chapter of the Lange series Introduction to Clinical Psychiatry, and has worked with bipolar patients for more than twenty-three years. He lives in Oakland, CA.