With other therapy or treatment, it is possible to shorten or delay imminent bipolar disorder in other patients. In others, you may even prevent the extreme moods altogether. Lithium carbonate for instance, is a natural mineral salt that can help to control both the manic and the depressive episodes. And there are a few others just like that. But please do not self-medicate; you should have a professional do your diagnosis and prescription for you.

There are all kinds of medication that may be used with bipolar disorder in a bid to stop the symptoms from making a mess of your life, although people respond to them in various ways. Lithium is one of such, but with as many as 40% of patients actually failing to respond to the medication in any way, you realize as well that there may be need for others. So a number of anticonvulsant drugs are offered that may help to dampen severe manic episodes. These are Tegretol and Depakene, which are carbamazepine and valproate respectively.

You could trace the history of bipolar disorder as far back as the time of Aretaeus of the second century. The ancient city of Turkey called Cappadocia was home to the age-old scientist and physician, who determined some of the symptoms of mania and depression that we see today in the syndrome. Unfortunately, even though he thought they were related, no one could understand it with him. Too bad, that. Today, work that would have been done all this while is only just being done today; but I still firmly believe that a cure is imminent.

People who have worked on depression and bipolar disorder over time have been numerous. Aretaeus of the second century, Richard Burton of the seventeenth, and Jules Falret of the nineteenth all did substantial and commendable work. Too bad there weren’t more scientists interested in the same thing; enough would have been known of the condition by now to end it.