Diagnosing Panic Disorders
Diagnosing panic disorders beings with the experience of the patient, but a qualified doctor and therapist can help to label the condition as well.
What You Can Do Now
If you're worried that you might be experiencing panic attacks too often, a good place to begin your diagnosis is to keep a journal of the panic attacks you have. Describe them in detail on a piece of paper, along with the date, the time, and any other information you feel might be helpful. In doing so, you will be able to find out whether there is a pattern to your panic attacks and whether you can change the course of your symptoms.
When you begin to find a pattern, try out various methods to control your symptoms. If you find something has worked for you in the past, that's great, but if you find that you've tried dozens of things without success, it's time to move to the next step of your panic disorder treatment.
Getting Professional Help
The sooner you seek help, the better your panic will be. With the help of your general practitioner, you will begin to look at your physical health to see if anything else might be causing your panic outside of your daily life's stresses. Talk with them about things you might be facing now and begin to look at other possible causes for your panic. You might be suffering from high blood pressure, for example, which can make your body feel more edgy than it actually is.
Your primary care doctor will probably give you a panic disorder medication to try out in order to see if this will be helpful. But if medication isn't your first choice, you can also turn to a mental health professional. By seeing a therapist, you will find out more about the causes of your panic as well as how to control them with or without medication.
No matter which medical professional you see, you will want to be as honest and as detailed as you can with the answers you give. In doing so, they can determine whether you are suffering from anxiety, stress, panic attacks, or a panic disorder. While these conditions are related, they each have different manners and methods in which they can be treated.
Panic disorders are generally diagnosed as having been present for at least two weeks time and as containing episodes of fear which last at least ten minutes. If this sounds like you, you may want to look into getting a firm diagnosis from a medical professional.