Seasonality and affective disorders: a report from North India

Case records of the patients with major affective disorders (ICD-IO criteri a), seen over a 5 year period in a busy clinic in North India were examined for Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) as per DSM-III-R criteria. In additi on, seasonality of episodes of all affective disorders was also studied. Ar ound 5.67% of the cases (n = 44) retrospectively met the DSM-III-R criteria of SAD and predominant pattern was that of summer depression (n = 18). The re was also a consistent pattern of seasonal mania either in conjunction wi th seasonal depression (n = IS) or in form of seasonal recurrent mania (n = 11). None of the casts of depression showed any atypical vegetative featur es. In cases not meeting criteria for SAD (I? = 731), there was a trend for peaks for depressive episodes in winter followed by a smaller peak in summ er months while manic episodes had peaks towards rainy and winter months. A s compared to seasonal patterns of affective disorders in temperate zones, there was a general trend For opposite patterns of seasonality in SAD as we ll as in non-SAD. The findings are discussed in context of the climatic con ditions of North India. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.