Role of stressful life events and kindling in bipolar disorder: Converging evidence from a mania-predominant illness course

Abstract

Stressful life events can precipitate relapses and recurrences in bipolar disorder. Kindling in bipolar disorder has been linked to maladaptive psychological reactivity to minor stressful life events. Systematic studies on life events and kindling are rare in bipolar disorder with a manic predominant polarity. One hundred and forty-nine remitted patients with bipolar I disorder were recruited. The National Institute of Mental Health-Life Chart Methodology was used to depict the illness course retrospectively, and the Presumptive Stressful Life Events Scale-Lifetime version was used to record the stressful life events. The role of stressful life events and the probability of kindling were assessed using appropriate statistics. There was a mania-predominant course of bipolar disorder in the sample with 55.7% (n = 83) having only recurrent mania. Family conflict and altered sleep patterns were the commonly reported stressful life events. When controlled for the severity of the stressor, the stressful life events were often associated with the initial episodes rather than the latter ones. Kindling may occur in bipolar disorder with mania as the predominant polarity. However, retrospective recall bias and hospital-based sampling limit generalizability of such observations.