Self diagnosis?

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The online tests for depression in particular are flawed because he test itself is flawed. They apply double points for symptom and consequence - ie I have lost my apetite and I have lost weight. Or I sleep much more than usual;I have a loss of energy. Some of those shouldn’t be in the test and some need clarifying. Disruptive sleep pattern will have wide reaching consequences including depression so it’s not so easy to measure with a stand-alone test.

I’m actually researching wellbeing and mental assessments right now and trying to create a better scale to work from when assessing depression in mental health practitioners.

Self diagnosis is only really useful in the sense that self awareness will be when trying to work with Doctors and therapists. What I like about these scales is that they help you to remember symptoms that you might otherwise forget to tell your physician - same for dissociation scales and eating disorder assessments. The biggest barrier in proper diagnosis can be that symptoms and discussion of them can take a long while to emerge to the physician.

I would never say you definitely had something from those tests but a high score certainly wants investigating.

Reply 21

bones-mccoy

I think it can be helpful but it depends on the situation and the illness. I could pretty much tell I had depression after feeling terrible for months but things like PD's and more complex disorders are a lot, lot more difficult to diagnose and with good reason. Recognising that you have a significant amount of symptoms of an illness for a length of time can aid people in realising something is wrong and seeking help themselves, off their own back, although I always think contacting your doctor to let them know how you're feeling and to double check is important. There's nothing wrong in saying "I think I have X illness, can you give me more information?"

I understand why a diagnosis can make some people feel better but it's getting the right treatment that's most important, rather than the label of an illness itself. There will always be kids who think having depression somehow makes them special or trendy, but thankfully that's a minority.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 22

jdddd

Original post by cat_mac

I’ve noticed a few people on here talking about depression, but saying they are self diagnosed. What are people’s opinions on this?

I think self diagnosis is positive if you just haven’t had the courage to go and seek help yet, but you recognise the symptoms in yourself. The first step to getting help is realising you need it and all that. Though it feels off to see people claiming they have/had severe depression but have never seen a doctor about it. That thread about “being depressed makes me happy” with someone claiming to have depression but describing enjoying being lazy and gaming all day, who won’t go to a doctor because they enjoy their life and are happy with their ‘depression’ just doesn’t sit right.

All it does is fuels misconceptions about depression by people who have only been diagnosed by online tests. It’s contributing to people thinking depression is just sadness, that it’s a mood rather than an illness.

No one should self diagnose themselves with anything. Just go to a Doctor. What treatments can you prescribe with your self diagnosis lol.

Reply 23

username3456172

I think you can feel depressed and be aware of it. People who rant on about how they are a self-diagnosed schizophrenic with psychosis and psychopathic tendencies are full of it.

Reply 24

Amullai

Original post by cat_mac

Personally I feel that people that are just sitting around and happy about being depressed are idiot. There not really depressed. You wouldn't be happy about feeling sad.

Reply 25

cat_mac

Original post by Amullai

Personally I feel that people that are just sitting around and happy about being depressed are idiot. There not really depressed. You wouldn't be happy about feeling sad.

Yep exactly, people just see depression in a movie and think it’s just feeling sad sometimes. The amount of misunderstanding of mental illness is ridiculous, especially with all the “awareness” campaigns.

Reply 26

brendarob

I think self diagnosing makes it worse, because then you're convinced that you actually have Depression and that'd make you feel worse because more of your attention is drawn to it?? Idk because I've never had mental health problems but I've self diagnosed with other things and it didn't help

Reply 27

BrianMcEgg

Absolutely not the way forward. If you self diagnose you become reliant on people and that WILL lead to decline in their mental health as they’ll be very in the neck of it. You don’t magically know about how to tackle depression etc, you need to get CBT at first for most cases in order to learn about YOU so you can tackle this issue and this can usually only happen with a diagnosis, counselling is often given by people that don’t have a degree in the mental health area at least in the UK. In some cases, anti depressants have to be prescribed if not enough progress is being made in the treatment you’re given, these can help initially. If you think you have it, you have to see a professional about it and get a result no exceptions

Reply 28

mkings2001

Personally I don’t agree in self diagnosis because too many people are claiming to have mental illnesses which they don’t actually have and it only makes it less concerning towards those who do genuinely have mental illnesses. That said, just because someone hasn’t been diagnosed by a doctor doesn’t mean they don’t have something. I’m sure many people will go through life without realising they even have a mental illness

Reply 29

dsmith23

Self diagnosing mood disorders such as depression is pretty dangerous in my opinion. There are a cluster of disorders with similar symptoms but with key distinctions and as such different treatments can work with varying degrees of success. Then there's the increased likelihood that you'll change your behaviour to fit a self diagnosis which is just... scary, really.

I've likely had some form of mood disorder or another for significant portions of my life thus far, but I won't ever say that I've definitely had depression or that I suffer from it. I've been recommended mood stabilisers and therapy but never had a formal diagnosis, and I think that it's damaging to the stigma around mental health when people without a formal diagnosis almost "show off" their self diagnosed mental health issue.

(edited 6 years ago)

Reply 30

rickyrossman

Self-diagnosis' are always going to be biased to some extent. You may end up reading the symptoms of a conditions, looking at your life and thinking it describes it perfectly. You may over or under exaggerate the intensity of what you're going through. Heck, even qualified physicians don't self-diagnose themselves with medical conditions. They go to another doctor and get them to do it because another person is going to unbiased in diagnosis.

Reply 31

Anonymous #4

I wouldn’t say I’ve self diagnosed but I’m becoming more aware and concerned of my mental health.

I’m 17 and I’m too scared to see a doctor because I don’t want my parents finding out.

I hope all gets better soon otherwise my 18th Birthday present from myself will be a booked doctor’s appointment.

Reply 32

cat_mac

Original post by Anonymous

Sorry you’re feeling so bad, you do have doctor-patient confidentiality as you’re over 16, so if you do go to see a doctor about it and ask them not to inform your parents, they won’t!

I spent many years waiting for it to sort it’s self out and when I did end up going to the doctor it was in a horrible state and not by choice. I know it’s difficult, but I really hope you can go and get help before things get any worse. (though my biggest hope is that it does get better before you feel doctors are needed)

Reply 33

Daddy Dagoth

I think it can sometimes be kinda insulting to those who have been medically diagnosed with a serious condition. Let's be honest, mental illnesses are seen by many as a sort of "trend" these days and I expect many self-diagnose without actually having the condition.

Reply 34

Anonymous #4

Original post by cat_mac

What if one of the main reasons for the way I feel is due to my poor family dynamic? Would my doctor need to tell my parents then?

Reply 35

mojojojo101

Original post by Anonymous

What if one of the main reasons for the way I feel is due to my poor family dynamic? Would my doctor need to tell my parents then?

Your doctor shouldn't tell your parents anything unless he thinks there is an immediate danger to you or someone else.

I have been diagnosed with depression 4 or 5 separate times, I am just no good at doing anti-depresents and I rarely managed to stick with it long enough to sit out the 6-8 week wait for talking therapies.

Its not that I self diagnose, I just recognise the signs that I am about to have an episode and fix it before it gets bad and I no longer can.

Reply 36

cat_mac

Original post by Anonymous

What if one of the main reasons for the way I feel is due to my poor family dynamic? Would my doctor need to tell my parents then?

I had a bit more of a look into it, and a doctor can’t legally tell your parents if you ask them not to, no matter what you tell them.

“If you’re aged 16 or 17, the law sees you as an adult when it comes to confidentiality and consent to treatment. Therefore, if you’re 16 and you want a health professional to keep your treatment confidential then that should be respected.”

The only time they can go over the confidentiality is is you don’t have “mental capacity” e.g. you can’t understand the advice given and that puts you in danger.
If there are issues with child protection (like if you’re in danger from your family) then they can involve other people too. This will only happen in very serious cases when you’re in immediate danger though!

(I got my info from here, it’s about self harm but the information applies to all mental health issues http://www.themix.org.uk/mental-health/self-harm/confidentiality-and-self-harm-5685.html )

Reply 37

doodle_333

Personally I think diagnoses in general aren't always that helpful. Self diagnosis certainly isn't. It's a shame we don't talk about mental illness like we do physical. We'd be quite happy to say 'I keep feeling dizzy'/'I've got a headache'/'I keep getting nauseous' and discuss our physical symptoms. We're happy to talk about how we might need a bit more iron or we're eating healthier/sleeping more to imrpove our physical health. Yet we don't feel like we can discuss mental health without a label. We should feel just as able to say 'I've been feeling really low' / 'I've lost my motivation for life' / etc without having to give it a formal label. We can often really miss the point with diagnoses - the real problem is the situation we;re in, or our past. And too many teens get way too invested in their labels.

Reply 38

Oaklasaurus

Original post by cat_mac

I'll be honest, self diagnosis is quite bad. If you recognise the symptoms - good! Go and get help. If you can't, and you're using the self help things online for that disorder? also brilliant, great idea.
But outright saying "I have depression" with no professional diagnosis can be a bit misleading. I used to Self DX but I went to a professional and what's actually driving this is anxiety/PTSD. Saying "I have some symptoms of x" and "I have x" are very different things.