COURSE OF ACUTE AFFECTIVE-DISORDERS IN A DEVELOPING-COUNTRY SETTING

This report on the Chandigarh Acute Psychosis Study examines the early course of affective disorders of acute onset in a developing country setting. Forty-one cases of acute onset affective disorder (17 depress ive and 24 manic subjects) were assessed at intake and evaluated at se lected intervals up to 1 year. The rates of recovery and relapse and e pisode duration were determined for both the depressive and manic grou ps, and the relationship between possible predictors of outcome and th e duration of the index episode was examined. All subjects experienced full recovery within the 1-year period. At 1-year follow-up, 71% of d epressive patients and 75% of manic patients demonstrated no symptoms or social impairment. For depression and mania, respectively, the mean episode duration was 14.2 and 10.2 weeks, and the rate of relapse was 18% and 21%. Overall, these outcomes are considerably more favorable than in comparable studies of affective disorders in developed setting s. Our findings suggest that acuteness of onset may be a major prognos tic factor in predicting the course of affective disorders.