Mental Health Care

It can happen any time. Your inner self presses the panic button for no rhyme or reason. All of a sudden, an attack of terror and apprehension overwhelms you. Your heart begins to race, your face flushes, and you have trouble breathing. You feel dizzy, queasy, out of control-some people even feel they are going crazy or are about to die.

Every year, millions of people across the world go through an experience like this. Many, fearing the worst, think they’re having a heart attack and rush to an emergency room. Others, though overtaken by fear, try to ignore it. But the story is much the same. Each of them just had a panic attack. Call it panic disorder, if you like. Once dismissed as ‘nerves’ or stress, a panic attack is now recognized as a potentially disabling but treatable condition. Typically, the attack lasts from a few seconds to several hours. Most attacks, however, peak within ten minutes and exit within 20 or 30 minutes, leaving its sufferer sometimes with a vague sense of exhaustion. They may come back any time and the unpredictability regarding their reappearance perturbs the victim with persistent anxiety. Life is laden with fear and one simply does not know what to do. Some people feel so inundated with fear that they stop stepping out of their homes.

The disorder is fairly common. It affects about two per cent people during their lives and twice as many women as men. The attacks typically begin in young adulthood-late teens and early twenties-and can recur throughout life. While some people experience panic attacks frequently, almost daily or every week, others suffer the attack less often. The condition tends to run in families; possibly heredity plays a role. If somebody has a diagnosed panic disorder, up to 18 per cent of his or her first-degree blood relatives may also suffer similarly. Studies done on identical twins also corroborate the genetic factor. If the disorder affects one of a pair of identical twins, the second twin runs a high risk of being similarly affected. But this kind of risk does not affect non-identical twins.

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