How Prevalent is Depression in America?

The statistics for adults (age 18 or over) suffering from depression:

In any given year - 12% of woman and 6.6 % of men (all types of depressive illnesses combined), Over their lifetime about 20% or women and 10% of men will have clinical depression.

In any given year - 6.5% of women and 3.3 % of men have major depression.

In any given year - 1% of both women and men suffer from bipolar disorder

In a lifetime - 5.4% of the population suffer from dysthymsia

Average Age of Onset:

Major Depression: mid-twenties

Dysthymia: childhood, adolescence, or early adulthood

Bipolar Disorder: early twenties

Anxiety Disorders Statistics

Anxiety disorders are even more common than depression. Anxiety often co-exists with depression. Approximately 13% of people between the ages of 18 and 54 have an anxiety disorder in a given year. Many people have more than one anxiety disorder.

The numbers for specific anxiety disorders in a given year are:

Panic Disorder: 1.7%

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD): 2.3%

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD): 3.6%

Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD): 2.8%

Social Phobia: 3.7%

Agoraphobia: 2.2%

Specific phobia: 4.4%

Approximately twice as many women as men suffer from panic disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, agoraphobia, and specific phobia, though about equal numbers of women and men have obsessive-compulsive disorder and social phobia.

See more statistics from National Institute of Mental Health:

NIH Publication No. 06-4584 - The Numbers Count: Mental Disorders in America
NIMH Publication No. 01-4607 - Women and Mental Health Research

Depression and Women

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