About 12 per cent of people across the world are affected by one anxiety disorder or the other, while anywhere between five and 30 per cent people are affected by it in their life. Women are more likely to be affected by an anxiety disorder than men, and they mostly occur between the ages of 15 and 35
BENGALURU:Like most psychiatric ailments, anxiety disorders, too, are caused by a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Before it is diagnosed as a disorder, anxiety can be experienced by different people in different manners. As such, anxiety is what we feel when we are worried, tense or afraid—or even a combination of all three. This is usually when things that are about to happen, or which we think could happen in the future. Anxiety is a natural human response when we perceive that we are under threat. It can be experienced through our thoughts, feelings and physical sensations.
There is good and bad
Most of us feel anxious at times. Anxiety can be categorised as good or bad—those that push us to reach for work in time, complete a task in time and in general make us productive, and objective, fall in the good category. However, there is also “bad” anxiety which comes on repeatedly without any apparent reason and affects our day-to-day activities, where we are unable to attend to things which need our involvement, and unable to help the situation around us. If anxiety is crippling, or hampering our day-to-day activity, it is time to go and see a doctor. It could be an anxiety disorder. Anxiety can become a mental health problem if it impacts your ability to live your life fully. These are the situations that could mean it is time to go see a doctor about your anxiety:
■ Your anxiousness is strong, and lasts for extended periods.
■ Your worries are out of proportion to the actual situation.
■ You avoid situations that might cause you to feel anxious.
■ Your worries feel very distressing or are hard to control.
■ Your anxiety starts to affect your functioning both personally and professionally.
There are different kinds of symptoms that might be indicative of anxiety disorder. Generic symptoms are feeling restless, irritable, having insomnia and angry outbursts. In worst cases, people suffer from panic attacks. There are also non-specific symptoms where different systems are affected like:
■ Neurological symptoms such as headaches and vertigo
■ Recurrent shortness of breath and heart palpitations
■ Increased motility and gastric pain - patients consulting other specialists for individual symptoms not knowing that anxiety is the root cause.
Types of anxiety
At times, it could be difficult to work out whether your symptoms are related to anxiety, or are just result of an overstressed situation, or even related to another illness. If you experience any physical symptoms, it’s best to see a doctor. There are two kinds of anxiety chronic and acute. Acute anxiety occurs with or without any cause or specific reason. However, if symptoms go unrecognised or untreated, it becomes chronic anxiety leading to a need for medical help. Chronic anxiety affects overall health and is a leading cause for a lot of ailments.
Some studies suggest that chronic anxiety increases the risk of developing certain long-term physical health problems, including diabetes, stomach ulcers and heart problems. However, it is still unclear about what exactly are the risks, or who are most likely to be affected. Self-help is usually the first treatment option offered where resources like books, breathing techniques, discipline in life, along with a work life balance, exercise and open communication is suggested.
However, if these do not help much, your doctor would offer you a talking treatment of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) or applied relaxation therapy. Medication help with acute anxiety in certain types of disorders. Prescriptive involvement i.e. involvement of experts is required when thinking errors or behavioural changes are evident in an individual due to the anxiety disorder. There are various treatments that have been found to help with anxiety problems and panic disorder. It includes a combination of self-help resources, talking treatments and medication.
The expert is a consultant of Psychiatry MS, MRC (Psych),CCT- Psychogeriatrics at Aster CMI Hospital