system overlap

• symptoms of schiz are found in other disorders which makes it difficult for clinicians to accurately identify which disorder the patient's suffering from
• According to Flanagan et al (2016) a patient could be diagnosed with schizophrenia using ICD, yet the same patient may fulfil the criteria for bipolar disorder according to DSM. This is unsurprising given the overlap of symptoms
• due to overlap of symptoms, it can be difficult to accurately distinguish between schiz and bipolar disorder, reducing validity of diagnosis
• Ophoff et al (2011) assessed the gene material from 50,000 participants to find that of seven gene locations on the genome associated with schizophrenia, three of them were also associated with bi-polar disorder.

  • this can help to explain the symptom overlap between bipolar disorder and schiz and why it can be hard to differentiate between the two