Illness anxiety disorder

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“”As I got in I was almost in tears. I sat there and I was shaking and I couldn't breathe

—Stephanie Huynh, a woman with IAD

Illness anxiety disorder (IAD), also called health anxiety, somatic symptom disorder, or hypochondria, is a relatively common disorder in which a person worries excessively about their health. This sometimes can be classified as self-diagnosis, but that's sort of a grey area. This is a genuine mental illness that often causes constant suffering for those who have this illness. They struggle with relationships, simple daily activities, and keeping a job.

It shares similarities to obsessive-compulsive disorder. Sufferers have persistent fears of potential illnesses and compulsions. They often compulsively visit the doctor. Approximately 75 to 85% of people with illness anxiety disorder have depression, anxiety, or another mental illness.

This condition is often lifelong.

Famous people with IAD include Andy Warhol, Marcel Proust, and Adolf Hitler.

Symptoms of illness anxiety disorder

• Worrying about one's health
• Constantly checking one's body for signs of illness
• Avoiding certain areas out of fear of infection
• Frequent doctor visits due to fear of illness
• Being alarmed about health test results
• Compulsively researching symptoms
• Not feeling better despite reassurance

In a cruel twist of fate, anxiety can cause mysterious symptoms like aches and pains, nausea, insomnia, dizziness, and more. To someone with IAD, this might be evidence that they are dying, and medical test results are likely to be inconclusive about the cause. The anxiety causes physical symptoms, the physical symptoms cause anxiety, and the vicious cycle continues.

People with IAD may hop from doctor to doctor, constantly fearing that their symptoms may be a terrible disease that has been overlooked by everyone else. Or they may avoid visiting the doctor for fear of getting terrible news.

Causes

Causes of IAD include:

• Child abuse
• Severe stress
• Illness or death of a loved one
• Other mental illnesses
• History of illness in childhood

It appears that people in their 20s are particularly susceptible.

Treatment

Once IAD has been identified, treatment can provide some relief. Options include:

• Cognitive behavioral therapy
  • Online Cognitive behavioral therapy works too
• Group therapy
• Behavioral stress management therapy
• Anti-anxiety pills
• Self help

Cyberchondria

"Cyberchondria" is caused by looking up diseases and symptoms on the internet. People may mistake symptoms of a mild problem for a severe problem, such as thinking that a stress headache is actually cancer.

Research has shown that people who google their symptoms commonly take the result that comes up first in the search engine as the most probable cause, despite the fact that this is not even slightly how search engines work.

And the healthcare system

This disorder poses obvious problems for any healthcare system. They consume time for healthcare professionals, with frequent visits to GPs and specialists, and often prove to be difficult patients: they are more likely to be more demanding of and dissatisfied with their physician, but also to be more help-rejecting.

Estimates of the cost of IAD vary widely. In the US, the figure of $20 billion per year is often used, going back to the early 2000s. In 2017 it was reported that IAD could cost the British National Health Service £56 million per year. Research in the UK has shown that 25%-50% of patients visiting their GPs may have unexplained pain or other unexplained symptoms.

This illustrates the importance of proper treatment for people with IAD: instead of constantly visiting the doctor about (often psychosomatic) symptoms, they should get appropriate anxiety treatment to help fight back against their habitual worrying.

Alternative medicine

Some practitioners of alternative medicine recommend marijuana as a treatment. Marijuana has also been recommended for other anxiety-related conditions, but without any evidence from clinical trials. Bamboo shavings are also suggested as a herbal cure. Bamboo may be useful if you are a panda, but its impact on humans isn't so clear.

See also

• Self-diagnosis
• Phobia
• Paranoia
• Placebo effect
• Factitious disorder (in which someone intentionally fakes an illness)
• Morgellons disease (a specific "skin disorder" that all properly-conducted scientific studies indicate is entirely in the sufferer's mind)

External links

• Hypochondriasis Cleveland Clinic
• Is it possible to think yourself sick? SBS
• Overcoming Health Anxiety, free online self-help course