One in five Americans mentally ill in past year: study
One in five adults in the United States, or nearly 50 million people, suffered mental illnesses in the past year with women and young adults suffering disproportionately, a government report released on Thursday found.
The survey by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration found women were more likely than men (23 percent to 16.8 percent) to have experienced a mental illness, while the rate of mental illness among people aged 18 to 25 was twice that of those aged 50 and older.
The administration defined mental illness among adults as diagnosable mental, behavioral or emotional disorders, excluding developmental disorders and substance use.
The survey found that 5 percent of American adults, or 11.4 million people, had suffered a serious mental illness in the past year that substantially interfered with their lives.
The report found that about 8.7 million American adults had serious thoughts of suicide in the past year, with 2.5 million making suicide plans and 1.1 million attempting to take their own lives.
Americans suffering mental illnesses were three times as likely to have developed substance dependence or substance abuse disorders than adults who had not experienced mental illness.
Among youths aged 12 to 17, 8 percent - or 1.9 million teenagers - experienced a major depressive episode in the past year, defined as a period of at least 2 weeks when a person experienced a depressed mood or loss of interest.
A new study (August 16, 2005) by Harvard University and the National Institute of Mental Health (search) claims that 46 percent of all Americans will, at some point in their lives, develop a mental disorder.
But this new statistic has experts arguing over exactly what constitutes a true mental illness.
According to experts, severe mental illnesses like schizophrenia, dementia and manic depression are relatively uncommon. But the updated Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (search), or DSM - the standard survey for mental illness - lists conditions like adjustment disorder, passive-aggressive disorder and female sexual arousal disorder as mental illness, reflecting what are claimed to be advances in the mental health profession.
Critics say that’s crazy, and that it won’t be long before all human quirks and flaws are classified as mental disorders.
“When you say we’re going to provide mental health treatment to everyone, then the severely mentally ill usually get the lowest priority,” said Dr. Richard Lamb (search), professor of Psychiatry at the University of Southern California.
Others say the DSM should be considered the mental health bible, because if it says that a person is mentally ill, then that person can get the treatment they need - and insurance companies will foot the bill.
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August 16, 2005 - FOXNews
Those teenagers who experienced a depressive episode also had twice the rate of illicit drug use than teenagers who had not experienced depression.
Mental Illness Affects 1 in 5 Americans
Nearly one in five adult Americans has experienced mental illness in the past year, according to a new government survey, with women, the unemployed, and young adults more likely than others to be affected.
Among those one in five - representing 45 million Americans - the survey found that nearly 20%, or nearly 9 million, also had substance dependence or abuse problems in the previous year.
The results are in the 2009 National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Mental Health Findings conducted by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), a public health agency within the Department of Health and Human Services.
“It’s a sobering report,” says Peter Delany, PhD, director of the Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality at SAMHSA.
Access to care is wanting, with less than four in 10 of those with mental health problems in the past year getting mental health help, the survey found.
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By Kathleen Doheny
WebMD Health News
The administration surveyed 67,500 people aged 12 and older in person around the United States.
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(Reuters)