Depression Blog

Depression is a mental illness that can disturb the person that is affected by it both mentally and physically and it can also disrupt the entire families life. Research shows that of the various types of depression at any given point in time numbers in the millions in the United States alone. According to the published studies there are over ten million Americans suffering from depression and this includes men, women and children that have been afflicted by one of the various types of depression at some point in their lives.

The Incidence of depression is used for the annual rate of diagnosis of depression and the prevalence means the number of people who have suffered from depression at any time in their lives. The statistics that have been compiled are from various studies and research dealing with depression and help the medical community know the amount of patients that are diagnosed yearly. Even though these statistics may not be all inclusive they are enough to measure the prevalence and incidences of depression at any given time, such as certain times of the year or when there is an outside factor such as a weather related event. While combined these two factors will give one number but alone the incidence of depression may have a greater number of cases than the prevalence of depression. The National Institute of Mental Health also known as NIMH explains this from the research and studies done on American’s.

One such study showed that approximately 6.5% of women would suffer from a major depressive disorder during some point in their lives. The American male population is 3.3% that will suffer from a major depressive disorder. When these numbers are combined and children who at some point be diagnosed with depression at some point averaged approximately 4%, along with men and women combined totaling 5.3% will be diagnosed or suffer from depression per year.

Another factor that was also added in was women with postpartum depression, which is approximately 1 out of every 679 new mothers. This number of women diagnosed with postpartum depression was low in numbers when compared with some other forms of depression.

According to the statistics a mild form of depression known as dysthymia affects approximately 1 out of every 24 people or 4.01% and this equals approximately 1.6% of the American adult population. This is from the findings of the National Institute of Mental Health 5.30 % of Americans for the prevalence of depression. This was compiled from research and statistics and they also feel that cases of depression may differ from country to country and even from region to region. They also only used cases that have been diagnosed and do not factor in people suffering from depression that have not yet been diagnosed.

When estimating the percentages the also have room for error in data that is not clear or research that the numbers were derived from estimating possible cases. This is because some studies are surveys that are done by telephone and this of course cannot be ensured as accurate information. The statistics also change from year to year due to outside factors such as tragic weather events, where more cases would be seen than in years when there are no events in the country that would lead to numbers of depression.