For people suffering from borderline personality disorder, securing friends and a job may be harder than getting relief from symptoms, states a new study.
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Borderline personality disorder is a mental illness afflicting about two percent of adults, mostly affecting young women. It is characterised by pervasive instability in moods, relationships, self-image and behaviour. Patients often need extensive mental health services, and account for 20 percent of psychiatric hospitalisations.
To see how those suffering from borderline personality disorder recover over the course of a decade, researchers followed 290 Americans with the condition. Interviews and self-report measures helped the researchers to track the participants' recovery process.
It was found that 50% of the participants recovered, which was defined as remission of symptoms and having good social and vocational functioning during the previous 2 years. Overall, 93% of participants attained a remission of symptoms lasting at least two years and 86% attained a sustained remission lasting at least four years. Thirty four percent of patients relapsed over a period of time. Recurrence of symptoms was seen in 30% and 15% patients respectively following a 2-year or a sustained remission.
The findings suggest that recovery from borderline personality disorder, with both symptomatic remission and good psychosocial functioning, seems difficult for many patients to attain but once attained, such a recovery is relatively stable over time.
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