3

This left a total of 68 respondents who were eligible to continue. Fifty-nine believed their diagnosis, three did not, and five didn\u2019t know. The sample included 48 women and 20 men, with an average age of 35.3 (range: 18-72 \u2013 see Table 2).

Table 2: Age Frequencies

When asked, all but one respondent wrote the names of up to six medications they had ever taken for their mood disorder. Only six of the 68 respondents had never stopped taking any medication for at least two weeks. The rest, 60 respondents, marked that they had stopped at least one medication at least one time (Table 3).

Of those who never discontinued any medication, the average number of inputted

medications was 3.16. Of those who had ever discontinued at least one medication, the average

number of medication names given was 4.52. This leads to interesting questions of causation. It

is common for people with bipolar disorder to have to experiment with many medications to find

a regimen that works, so it\u2019s possible that those who had never stopped taking any medication

were simply more successful upon their initial medication attempt.



Three participants remarked that they did not believe their diagnosis, five said that they

did not know or did not wish to answer, and the remaining 59 answered that they believed their

diagnosis. There were no significant associations between discontinuation and belief in the

diagnosis, probably due to the low statistical power.



The final number of eligible respondents, those who had ever discontinued taking

medications and who continued with the survey, was 61, or 67.0% of all those who logged in.

Age

Frequency

18-25

19

26-40

29

44-72

20