Mental health status of patients with bipolar disorder during COVID-19 lockdown: a cross-sectional study at El Khanka Psychiatric Hospital

The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated a number of measures including lockdowns and social distancing. These measures affected mental health in healthy individuals and mentally affected patients. Studies examining the effectiveness of such strategies are still limited, and those with bipolar disorder (BD) are an especially vulnerable population. The current research aimed to evaluate the mental health status of BD patients throughout the pandemic, particularly as regards increasing the rate of relapse and appearance of other psychiatric comorbidities, and to evaluate and contrast the acute stress and psychological association experienced by persons with BD and those without mental diseases through the pandemic. A total of 103 participants were involved in the study, 50 in the diseased group and 53 in the healthy group. Concerning demographic data, there was significant variation among the two groups concerning gender, marital status, education, employment, and socio-economic status. A study of COVID-19’s association with psychometric data revealed a significantly higher score of IES-R in healthy participants compared to diseased. A comparison of COVID-19-affected patients and COVID-19-not affected patients revealed a statistically significant association between the IES-R median score result and COVID-19 effects. There was no significant distinction between healthy and diseased groups concerning scales of depression, anxiety, or insomnia. However, COVID-19 pandemic significantly affected routine life stress and acute stress measured by IES-R.