Health and Psychology

The DIagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Fifth Edition (DSM V) is published by the American Psychiatric Association.  It is due out next year.  Already the complaints are coming in about it not having an adequate research basis for many diagnostic categories.  The is another diagnostic system: The International Classification of Disease 10th Edition (ICD 10).  As a result of problems with the DSM system many psychologists will be switching over to the ICD 10 system of diagnosis.

So what are the problems?  There has been a tendency in the DSM-IV to lessen the clinical criteria for diagnosis.  This has led to more people being prescribed psychiatric medications for conditions that would have been questionable in previous years.  It's also allowed for children down to preschool age children to get diagnosed with psychiatric conditions that would have been considered a normal part of childhood adjustment.  This includes attention deficit disorder and childhood bipolar disorder.  It also includes neurological conditions being misclassified as childhood schizophrenia.  These problems are continued into DSM V and additional problems have been created.  There is a new diagnosis called Dysruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder, which will make temper tantrums into a diagnosis.  It has eliminated Asperger's Disorder and combined Asperger's Disorder with Autistic Spectrum Disorder.  There are other changes as well that may impact education and the need for educational accommodations.

Psychology and psychiatry have had difficulties with diagnosis and the need for research to back up diagnoses being used.  The new DSM V is likely to do more harm than good in this regard.