Bipolar disorder: depressive phases go hand in hand with lower sexual desire

How do mood swings affect the sexuality of people with bipolar disorder? A team led by Helle B. Krogh of the Sexology Clinic at Copenhagen University Hospital, including professors Annamaria Giraldi and Maj Vinberg, set out to answer this question. The study was published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research; the science news site PsyPost reported on it on 30 October. The researchers followed 236 adults aged 18 to 68 who had been diagnosed within the previous two years. They attended assessments at the start, after three months and after six months, at which clinicians rated depressive and manic symptoms; participants also rated their mood daily in a smartphone app and completed questionnaires on sexual functioning and quality of life.

The result: more severe depressive symptoms were associated with lower sexual desire and greater sexual distress – even after accounting for age and sex. More severe manic symptoms were linked to greater desire, but not to distress. Those whose mood fluctuated more from day to day reported more sexual distress. Better quality of life was associated with less distress, but not with desire. Notably, more than 60 percent of the variation in sexual outcomes was attributable to person-specific factors rather than to clinical mood symptoms. On average, women reported lower desire than men, and older participants lower desire than younger ones.

The study shows associations, not causes. Patients taking certain antidepressants with sexual side effects were excluded; many participants were also in full or partial remission, and people with more severe symptoms may have dropped out early. High mania scores were rare, so the findings apply only to a limited extent to severe manic episodes. The report does not give details of funding. The work is part of Krogh's doctoral thesis 'Bipolar Disorder and Sexuality' at the University of Copenhagen, supervised by Giraldi and Vinberg.