Bipolar Disorder has been discovered many years ago however, a lot of people find it hard to understand the condition and was not accepted as an illness right away. The history of Bipolar Disorder can be traced back as far as the second century when Aretaeus from the ancient city of Turkey called Cappadocia determined some of the symptoms of mania and depression. He thought that both mania and depression warning signs were interrelated. The world of medicine didn’t recognize his findings back then since no one was able to support his theory.

The next study that followed the second century findings wasn’t around for many centuries. It was only made public in 1650 when Richard Burton, a scientist, wrote and published a book called "The Anatomy of Melancholia." He was the first one to successfully study the condition of depression and his book is still widely used today in the mental health field as a key reference. Because of this, he was named the father of depression as a mental illness.

In 1854, Jules Falret instigated the term "folie circulaire" which means circular insanity because he discovered the difference between the depression moments and heightened moods of an individual. He even supported that depression and suicide are both linked together. His findings of depression and manic episodes led to the term Bipolar Disorder but in 1875, his findings were officially called Manic-Depressive Psychosis and it has been recognized as a psychiatric disorder that is different from simple depression alone. Falret even proved that the disease has a genetic linkage as he observed that it is present within certain families.

Francois Baillarger has made an important role in the history of Bipolar Disorder as he differentiated bipolar disorder from schizophrenia for their characteristics of depressive phase. His findings allowed the Bipolar Disorder to be classified apart from the other known mental disorders during the era.

Emil Krapelin in 1913 coined the term manic-depressive as he studied the effects of depression and manic episodes. His unique approach to the mental illness was fully accepted during his time and became the most widely accepted theory of the early 1930’s.

In 1948, Dr. John Cade, a Psychiatrist of Bundoora Repatriation Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, was able to discover the positive effects of Lithium Carbonate in treating some of the World War II veterans who have been experiencing manic-depressive psychosis. This was the first time a drug has been discovered to have some successful effect in treating a psychiatric condition. Until now, the compound of Lithium Carbonate is being widely used as a medication for the Bipolar Disorder.

The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disorder published an article in 1952 about the genetic linkage of manic-depressive. It has revealed the possibility of manic-depressive to run in the family stricken with the mental illness. In the 1960’s, anyone who has been showing the symptoms of the disease were institutionalized but were given little help by the government since they refused to accept manic-depression as a mental illness. The early 1970’s made the mark for new laws that established to help those who were afflicted with the manic-depressive illness. The year 1979 was the year of birth of the National Association of mental health or NAMI.

The term Bipolar Disorder replaced the known manic-depressive disorder in 1980 when the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association used it as a diagnostic term. Throughout the 1980’s, studies have been conducted to tell the difference between adult and childhood bipolar disorders. To this day, the history of Bipolar Disorder continues to prosper as more and more studies are being conducted to know the probable causes as well as newer methods to treat the mental illness.

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