- Hi, everyone, in today's video,
we are going to be talking about
what depression with psychotic features
and what bipolar with psychotic features are.
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My name is Lauren and I make videos about
what it's like living with Schizoaffective disorder
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Okay, so what are depression
and bipolar with psychotic features?
Depression with psychotic features,
also called psychotic depression,
and bipolar with psychotic features
are subtypes of major depression
and of bipolar disorder respectively.
They occur when a severe depressive or manic episode
includes some form of psychosis.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health,
someone who is psychotic is out of touch with reality.
Psychosis could include hallucinations,
such as hearing voices or seeing things
that are not really there,
delusions, which are essentially false beliefs
not grounded in reality or false perceptions,
or some other break with reality.
Major depressive disorder, or MDD, with psychotic features
is associated with significant morbidity and mortality,
but often goes underdiagnosed and undertreated.
It occurs in nearly 18.5% of patients
who are diagnosed with MDD
and affects roughly one out of every four people admitted
to the hospital for depression.
People experiencing major depression with psychotic features
may get angry for no apparent reason.
They may also spend a lot of time alone
or in bed sometimes sleeping during the day
and being awake during the night.
They may have a difficult time keeping up
with personal hygiene and appearances.
They may also be harder to talk to
or sometimes even barely talk
or speak in a way that does not make sense.
In bipolar disorder with psychotic features,
the psychotic symptoms tend to match the mood episode
the individual is experiencing be it mania or depression.
We have a video that goes into detail about what bipolar is
and what mania and depression are
that you can check out here.
During a manic phase,
a person may believe they have superpowers
or something along those lines.
Experiencing psychosis during a manic episode
can be dangerous as it can often lead
to more reckless or dangerous behavior.
With both major depression with psychotic features
add bipolar with psychotic features,
the psychotic features can present as mood congruent.
This basically just means that if a person
is experiencing a depressive episode,
the content of their delusions and hallucinations
will be more depressive in nature
along the lines of personal inadequacy,
guilt, disease, death, nihilism or deserved punishment.
If a person is experiencing a manic episode,
the content of the delusions and hallucinations
will be more along the lines of euphoria,
grandiosity, et cetera.
People with other mental illnesses
also experience psychosis,
the most prominent being schizophrenia.
However, like I mentioned,
depression and bipolar with psychotic features
generally have delusions and hallucinations consistent
with their mood episode.
Whereas psychosis and schizophrenia
generally entails more erratic or implausible symptoms
with no obvious connection to a mood state.
The exception is with Schizoaffective disorder,
which is essentially schizophrenia combined
with a major mood disorder such as depression or bipolar.
The difference between Schizoaffective disorder
and depression or bipolar with psychotic features
is that with Schizoaffective disorder,
the psychosis occurs even when no mood episode is present.
People experiencing depression
or bipolar with psychotic symptoms
may be embarrassed or ashamed of the thoughts
they are experiencing and try to hide them.
This is one of the reasons this type of depression
and bipolar are more difficult to diagnose.
Depression and bipolar with psychosis can be quite serious
and the risk of suicide is quite high.
Usually, though, treatment for psychotic depression
or bipolar disorder takes place in the hospital.
This allows a safe space to stabilize a person again
and under the monitoring of mental health professionals.
Medications are commonly used to help stabilize the person
and most often include combinations of antidepressants
or mood stabilizers and anti-psychotic medications.
The combination of these medications
is significantly more effective
than solely using an antidepressant,
mood stabilizer or anti-psychotic.
Treatment for these illnesses can be very effective.
People are often able to recover
usually within several months or so.
It can be important to keep following up
with a medical care team though.
So I hope this video helped you to better understand
what both depression with psychotic features
and bipolar with psychotic features are.
If you have any experiences with either of these
that you'd like to share,
we'd love to hear from you in the comments below.
If you'd like to see more videos like this one from us,
make sure to subscribe,
and just another quick reminder
to check out the link to our Patreon page
if you'd like to help support us
in making this educational content.
Thanks so much for watching,
and as always, wishing you and your loved ones good health.
We'll see in the next video, bye.