Bipolar Genetics – How Strong Is The Link Between Genes and Bipolar Disorder?
With modern DNA sequencing, scientists still have only scraped the surface, in determining how genes are expressed. As of yet, scientists have not been able to find out which gene or genes are responsible for bipolar disorder, but here are some statistics which should interest you:
Immediate relatives such as a dad, brother, or sister of someone who has bipolar disorder, have a 10% greater risk of developing bipolar disorder than the general population.
A fraternal twin has a 15% chance of suffering from bipolar disorder if their twin also suffers from the illness.
Identical twins will share bipolar disorder about 70% of the time, indicating a strong genetic link with the illness.
Clearly, if bipolar was simply 100% genetic, identical twins would share bipolar disorder 100% of the time. Scientists think that there are many factors which may turn on bipolar genes including traumatic life events and environmental factors.
In addition, there are many different types of bipolar disorder, such as bipolar I, bipolar II, or schizoaffective disorder, which may mean that by the illness is caused by a series of genes which can be variably expressed, which can cause very mild or very strong symptoms.
Scientists also believe that other mental illnesses such as schizophrenia share the same genes as bipolar disorder, most commonly evidenced by schizoaffective disorder, which combines the worst aspects of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.
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