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A sudden outburst of academic achievement could be a sign of mental illness, as one high school student in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province recently discovered.
"Xiaoqin" was diagnosed with bipolar disorder last week after he was mistakenly diagnosed with depression and suddenly achieved better grades in school.
Bipolar disorder is a mental disorder that causes sufferers to experience exhilarating, energetic highs, and depressing, sometimes suicidal, lows.
The cause of the mental illness is unknown. According to Medical News Today (MNT), it may be the result of a range of factors, including genetic components, brain-chemical imbalances, hormonal problems as well as environmental factors.
After entering his senior year of high school, Xiaoqin struggled academically, and had reportedly given up on his studies.
His mother took him to see a psychiatrist at a local hospital. After two weeks of medication, Xiaoqin behaved like different person. He studied hard throughout the night and ranked fifth in his class during a recent exam.
Psychiatrist Cai Wei realized that Xiaoqin was suffering from bipolar disorder instead of depression after receiving a call from his mother.
“(During our first consultation) I repeatedly asked if the boy was in a good mood, acted positively and became talkative, but both the mother and son denied this,” Dr. Cai told Hangzhou Daily.
Xiaoqin’s unexpected behavior recently switched from being a studious pupil to one who remained in bed in silence.
Similarly, a woman from Chengdu, southwest China's Sichuan Province, received refunds in the amount of tens of millions of yuan this month after her mental illness led her to take irrational shopping sprees since 2012.
Dr. Deng Hong, who practices medicine in a hospital in Sichuan Province, told Chengdu Business Daily that some patients can become aggressive, unable to regulate their emotions like normal people, and experience symptoms of psychosis.
There is speculation that many famous artists and entertainers throughout history suffered from bipolar disorder, such as artist Vincent van Gogh, composer Ludwig van Beethoven and writer Edgar Allan Poe.
There is no official data on the number of people suffering from bipolar disorder in China. However, the University of Hong Kong’s Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine indicated that around 5.5 percent – or one in 20 people – in Hong Kong suffer from bipolar disorder.
(CGTN)
