Profile of a phobia
A study of more than 9,000 members of a large health maintenance organization (HMO) presented recently at the 37th Annual Meeting of the American College of Neuropsychopharma-cology in Las Croabas, Puerto Rico, revealed the following profile of individuals with generalized social phobia (GSP):
• Mean age of patients was 42.81 years.
• Mean age of onset was 12.71 years.
• Nearly 29% of GSP patients had a mental health visit in the past 12 months.
• Nearly 30% of GSP patients had filled at least one antidepressant prescription.
• GSP patients were 10% less likely to graduate from college than HMO members without GSP.
• Nearly 25% of GSP patients reported a lifetime history of suicide attempts, compared to 5% of HMO members without GSP.
• Patients with GSP had total health care costs of $2,466, compared to $1,959 for HMO members without GSP during the same reporting period, for a difference of $507.
• Roughly 44% of GSP patients had a comorbid diagnosis on tool to measure mental health and substance abuse. In 70% of GSP patients, the onset of GSP preceded the onset of the comorbid disorder.
• Only .5% of the 8.2% of HMO members identified with GSP had a diagnosis of social phobia in the HMO’s administrative database.
Another study presented in May at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Association in Washington, DC, found that most individuals with social anxiety disorder wait more than 10 years to seek treatment.
Researchers from the New York State Psychiatric Institute in New York City examined help-seeking patterns in a sample of people with social anxiety disorder who participated in the 1998 National Anxiety Disorders Screening Day.
A telephone follow-up survey of 200 screening participants who screened positive found the following:
• Average delay from anxiety onset to first professional contact for treatment was 12.7 years.
• Average delay to confide in a friend or family member about social anxiety was 7.7 years.
• Most commonly cited reasons for not seeking treatment were uncertainty of where to go for help (46%); problems affording treatment or lack of mental health benefits (51%); a belief that anxiety could be controlled without professional help (21%); and a fear of what others might think (16%).
• Only 20% of patients who sought treatment were diagnosed with social anxiety disorder.
• More than half of those who did receive a diagnosis of social anxiety disorder were prescribed medications or received psychotherapy. Of those receiving medication, 70% felt their therapy was helpful in relieving their anxiety. Of those receiving psychotherapy, 86% felt their treatment was helpful in relieving their anxiety.
Source: Katzelnick DJ, Kobak KA, Helstad CP, et al. The direct and indirect costs of social phobia in managed care patients. Presented at the 37th annual Meeting of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. Las Croabas, Puerto Rico; December 1998.
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