Structure of cognitive disorders in patients with primary episode of bipolar affective disorder

Abstract

Bipolar affective disorder (BAD) is one of the most pressing problems of modern psychiatry; cognitive impairment has one of the leading places in the structure of symptoms of bipolar disorder. The aim of the study was to compare the structure of cognitive disorders in patients with a primary episode (PE) of BAD, based on sex and clinical version of the disease debut. Results and discussion. Based on clinical examination of 65 men and 88 women with PE of BAD was revealed that the basis of cognitive manifestations of depressive type of disorder constitute of slowing of cognition, attention deficit and executive functions: slow thinking, impaired attention concentration, difficulties in planning and decision making, rigidity of thinking. Cognitive symptoms of manic type of PE of BAD were based on disorders of thinking: accelerated thinking, increased self-esteem, exaggeration of own possibilities, disturbance of concentration of attention, difficulties in planning and decision making. The mixed version of PE of BAD was characterized by a complex combination of cognitive symptoms, the spectrum of which included both manifestations of thinking disorders and difficulty of attention concentrating. Conclusions. In the PE of BAD, the spectrum of cognitive symptomatology is determined by the clinical variant: in depressive the phenomena of cognitive slowing, attention deficit and performance functions are dominated, in the manic – the disorder of thinking, and in the mixed variant, all the spectrum of disorders are present; gender influence has no significant effect on the structure of cognitive symptomatology.

Keywords

• bipolar affective disorder
• primary episode
• cognitive disorders