Relationship of childhood physical and sexual abuse to adult bipolar disorder

Objectives: To characterize whether adult depressives with either bipolar o r unipolar disorder differ in the prevalence of childhood sexual or physica l abuse. Method: The investigators reviewed data from patients who were evaluated ov er a 2-year period by a semi-structured clinical interview. In total, 333 c ases with a bipolar or unipolar diagnosis were included in the present stud y. Results: A childhood history of abuse, in particular sexual abuse, was sign ificantly more frequent in bipolar subjects compared with unipolar subjects . Consistent with previous studies, women reported higher rates of sexual a buse than men, although no interaction by diagnosis was shown. Sexual abuse incidence in male samples was markedly dissimilar, with male bipolar subje cts demonstrating a significantly increased rate of sexual abuse and combin ed sexual and physical abuse compared with unipolar male subjects. Conclusion: The increased incidence of sexual abuse in women supports growi ng evidence of gender differences in sexual abuse among adult depressives. In contrast to literature reports, the finding that male bipolar patients h ave significantly increased rates of sexual abuse histories suggests differ ences in psychiatric depressive subgroups. This result may reflect the part icular characteristics of our cohort (treatment resistant, privately insure d, and educated). Further work will aid in characterizing sexual abuse prev alence in other male bipolar samples.