The New Hamburg-Hannover Agitation Scale in Clinical Samples: Manifestation and Differences of Agitation in Depression, Anxiety, and Borderline Personality Disorder

Abstract

Background/Aims: Agitation is a burdening phenomenon that occurs in a variety of psychiatric disorders. The aim of this study was to give a first direction for agitation occurrence in depression, anxiety disorder, and borderline personality disorder (BPD) as well as in healthy controls with and without psychiatric record. Methods: Using the Hamburg-Hannover Agitation Scale (H₂A), an instrument that allows for the measurement of agitation independently of the presence of a specific disorder, a patient sample (n = 158) and a healthy control group (n = 685) with (n = 94) and without (n = 591) psychiatric record were examined. The data were mainly analysed using ANOVAs and post hoc tests. Results: Patients showed significantly higher H₂A agitation levels than healthy controls. Within the clinical sample, BPD patients exhibited the strongest manifestation of agitation, scoring significantly higher than the depression and the anxiety disorder sample, while these two subgroups did not significantly differ from each other. Moreover, healthy subjects with a psychiatric record experienced a significantly stronger agitation than subjects without a psychiatric record. Conclusion: Further studies are needed with larger, more balanced, and differentiated sample sizes including a wider range of clinical pictures. The results demonstrate that agitation occurs and differs in psychiatric patients as well as in healthy controls.