Anxiety disorders are among the most common mental disorders. Around 15 percent of all people suffer from an anxiety disorder at some point in their lives. Those affected have an exaggerated, non-specific fear or a specific phobia of a certain object or situation. Social phobia is one of the most common anxiety disorders.
Here you will find further information and selected therapists for anxiety disorders.
Anxiety is a disorder if
Those affected tend to avoid situations that cause them anxiety. As a result, many anxiety disorders lead to an enormous reduction in quality of life and performance. For example, people with social phobia rarely socialize and are unable to try out many new things.
Anxiety disorders are divided into several clinical pictures according to ICD-10:
You can find more detailed information below.
If they are not treated, anxiety disorders often become chronic. They are often accompanied by depression. Due to the frequent treatment with addictive tranquilizers, addiction disorders can also occur.
Pathological anxiety often manifests itself in stressful situations of all kinds. Those affected often have an anxious parent as a "learning model". The fears become entrenched as a disorder when those affected begin to avoid anxiety-inducing situations.
Most anxiety disorders can be treated well with outpatient behavioral therapy. Treatment begins with the search for an explanatory model for the anxiety.
Part of the treatment involves confronting those affected with anxiety-inducing situations in a controlled manner. Together with their therapist, they seek out precisely those situations that they normally avoid due to their fears. This could include
belong. Experience has shown that anxiety can be reduced well in this way.
In addition, sufferers often have to learn to better recognize stress and reduce their stress levels.
Individual panic attacks are not yet considered a panic disorder. A panic disorder is present when the panic leads to suffering for those affected and impairs their lifestyle.
For those affected, panic attacks come out of the blue, at least at first.
They manifest themselves in sometimes dramatic symptoms such as
In addition, there are massive fears, e.g.
These symptoms are often exacerbated by hyperventilation. Those affected breathe very quickly and therefore take in too much oxygen. Those affected usually leave the situations in which panic attacks occur in a hurry.
In claustrophobia, sufferers are afraid of closed, confined spaces such as elevators © Ilja | AdobeStock
Panic attacks last for varying lengths of time, but usually no longer than 30 minutes.
Agoraphobia is when sufferers avoid certain places due to the fear of panic attacks, such as
Those affected have an almost constant fear of new panic attacks (anticipatory anxiety). As a result of this problem, they are extremely restricted in their performance and freedom of movement. The irrationality of their fear is completely clear to them.
Around 15 to 30 percent of all people suffer a panic attack at least once in their lives. However, only around 3 percent also develop a panic disorder, with around twice as many women as men being affected.
It usually begins in young adulthood.
Panic disorders are most successfully treated with behavioral psychotherapy. As mentioned above, the most important component of therapy is confrontation with the anxiety-inducing situations.
Many sufferers also experience support and relief from panic attacks. For example, relatives go shopping for them, they are often accompanied by their partner, etc.
Those affected often find it extremely difficult to ask for support and relief directly. In relationships, panic patients "do not get their due" in one way or another. Such problems must also be dealt with in therapy.
Medication, especially antidepressants with a serotonergic effect, can also be used to treat panic disorders. Due to their high risk of dependency, tranquilizers such as benzodiazepines (e.g. Tavor®) should only be given temporarily for a short period of time.
Case study: Panic disorder
A 35-year-old woman, employed, married, mother of a son, is sent to a behavioral therapy outpatient clinic by her family doctor after thorough and repeated organic examinations have revealed no evidence of a physical illness.
She has been suffering from recurring, overwhelming feelings of fear of death and panic for two years. The first time she experienced this was when she visited her uncle, who had unexpectedly suffered a heart attack, in intensive care. She was very nervous, had to wait longer outside the ward and drank two cups of coffee during this time. When she finally stood in front of her uncle, who was lying there completely lifeless, she was terrified. She also had the feeling that she was about to faint, so she had to leave the ward again quickly.
Since then, the fear has always occurred in connection with contact with her uncle's family. It also manifests itself in doctors' surgeries and hospitals, and for a few months now also in the city, in department stores and in places with lots of people. In the meantime, she can no longer go to the doctor alone with her son and can hardly go shopping on her own.
It is worked out with the patient that although panic attacks are extremely unpleasant, they are not dangerous. She begins, initially with therapeutic support, to specifically seek out situations in which she experiences panic. She notices that the panic attacks, which were initially severe, become less severe with each exercise. After 9 months, the patient's lifestyle is completely unaffected again and she only experiences slight bouts of panic.
The main problem with social phobia is fear of and avoidance of "public" situations, e.g.
Those affected are mainly afraid of embarrassing themselves or being judged negatively by others. In addition to typical anxiety symptoms such as panic attacks, blushing or trembling often occur in the feared situations.
Many people are shy. A social phobia, on the other hand, exists when
Social phobias are very common. Around 13 percent of all people are affected, women slightly more often than men. It usually begins at school.
It particularly affects people who have always had a strong tendency to self-doubt and at the same time place high demands on themselves. They pay close attention to what is going on inside them ("heightened self-awareness").
Behavioral therapy treatment also involves confronting the anxiety-inducing situation. In addition, the focus is also on training social skills, e.g.
Therapy in a group is ideal, as patients can support each other. On the other hand, they are automatically confronted with one of their feared situations in the group.
A specific phobia is when the person concerned is afraid of a certain object (e.g. spiders).
has. Such a fear is only defined as a disorder if it restricts the affected person's ability to cope with everyday life. This would be the case, for example, for a business traveler with a fear of flying.
Such restrictive phobias can be treated very well by confronting the feared situation.
People with generalized anxiety disorder worry and worry a lot about everyday matters. They worry about their well-being and that of their family without any real cause for concern.
As a result, they are constantly anxious and tense and can hardly end this state on their own. A disorder is only diagnosed when the symptoms have been present for more than six months.
Around 5 percent of all people are affected, women more often than men. Generalized anxiety disorder usually begins in adolescence or early adulthood.
Those affected usually do not seek psychotherapeutic treatment directly. They suspect physical illnesses and therefore repeatedly consult general practitioners and physicians.
Psychotherapeutically, cognitive therapy is indicated for generalized anxiety disorder. In this
However, this therapy is less successful than confrontation therapy for more specific fears.
The Leading Medicine Guide's quality assurance is ensured by the following acceptance prerequisites.
