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Lifetime and six-month prevalence of mental disorders in the Munich follow-up study

European Archives of Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience volume 241, pages 247–258 (1992)Cite this article

Summary

The Lifetime and 6 month DSM-III prevalence rates of mental disorders from an adult general population sample of former West Germany are reported. The most frequent mental disorders (lifetime) from the Munich Follow-up Study were anxiety disorders (13.87%), followed by substance (13.51%) and affective (12.90%) disorders. Within anxiety disorders, simple and social phobia (8.01%) were the most common, followed by agoraphobia (5.47%) and panic disorder (2.39%). Females had about twice the rates of males for affective (18.68% versus 6.42%), anxiety (18.13% versus 9.07%), and somatization disorders (1.60% versus 0.00%); males had about three times the rates of substance disorders (21.23% versus 6.11%) of females. Being widowed and separated/divorced was associated with high rates of major depression. Most disordered subjects had at least two diagnoses (69%). The most frequent comorbidity pattern was anxietyand affective disorders. Simple and social phobia began mostly in childhood or early adolescence, whereas agoraphobia and panic disorder had a later average age of onset. The majority of the cases with both anxiety and depression had depression clearly after the occurrence of anxiety. The DIS-DSM-III findings of our study have been compared with both ICD-9 diagnoses assigned by clinicians independently as well as other epidemiological studies conducted with a comparable methodology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Max Planck Institute for Psychiatry, Clinical Institute, Kraepelinstr. 10, W-8000, Munich 40, Germany

    Hans-Ulrich Wittchen, Cecilia Ahmoi Essau, Detlev von Zerssen, Jürgen-Christian Krieg & Michael Zaudig

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  1. Hans-Ulrich Wittchen
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  2. Cecilia Ahmoi Essau
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  3. Detlev von Zerssen
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  4. Jürgen-Christian Krieg
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  5. Michael Zaudig
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Wittchen, HU., Essau, C.A., von Zerssen, D. et al. Lifetime and six-month prevalence of mental disorders in the Munich follow-up study. Eur Arch Psychiatry Clin Nuerosci 241, 247–258 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02190261

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Key words

  • Epidemology
  • lifetime and 6-month prevalence
  • DIS/DSM-III disorders
  • Comorbidity
  • Age of onset