ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: The bipolar disorder is an important health problem. It presents with severe sintoms, and it tends to cronify. Although lithium has a prophilactic role, it has not controlled the development of severe psychosocial complications. It is necessary to study the psychosocial aspects related to this disorder, to define the areas in which the psychosocial interventions are needed, and the types of psychosocial approaches that can be useful. METHODS: Review of the literature, through MEDLINE database in the last fifteen years, about psychosocial complications of bipolar disorder and its treatment. RESULTS: Many articles emphasize the important psychosocial deficits that appear in patients with bipolar disorder. These deficits concern to all social functions and persist for a long time. The patients are more vulnerable to stressing events, that can have devastating consecuences. The articles report the influence in the evolution and prognosis of this disorder, by the comorbidity of other medical and pschiatric problems. The psychotherapeutical interventions can be of interest to treat the social aspects that lithium fails to control. CONCLUSIONS: Our approach would tend to integrate in the clinical practice both, the biomedical and psychosocial theories. This permits an integral treatment of all the factors implicated in the genesis, maintenance, and consecuences of the mental disorders.
