Clinical status of comorbid bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder

Abstract

Background: The status and differentiation of comorbid borderline personality disorder and bipolar disorder is worthy of clarification.

Aims: To determine whether comorbid borderline personality disorder and bipolar disorder are interdependent or independent conditions.

Method: We interviewed patients diagnosed with either a borderline personality disorder and/or a bipolar condition.

Results: Analyses of participants grouped by DSM diagnoses established that those with comorbid conditions scored similarly to those with a borderline personality disorder alone on all key variables (i.e. gender, severity of borderline personality scores, developmental stressors, illness correlates, self-injurious behaviour rates) and differed from those with a bipolar disorder alone on nearly all non-bipolar item variables. Similar findings were returned for groups defined by clinical diagnoses.

Conclusions: Comorbid bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder is consistent with the formal definition of comorbidity in that, while coterminous, individuals meeting such criteria have features of two independent conditions.