Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) is a relatively common and impairing disorder. However, little is known about non-BDD symptoms and well-being in patients with this disorder. Seventy-five outpatients with DSM-IV BDD completed the Symptom Questionnaire, a validated self-report measure with four scales: depression, anxiety, somatic/somatization, and anger-hostility. Scores were compared to published norms for normal subjects and psychiatric outpatients. Participants in an openlabel fluvoxamine trial completed the Symptom Questionnaire at baseline and endpoint. Compared to normal controls, BDD subjects had markedly elevated scores on all four scales, indicating severe distress and psychopathology. Compared to psychiatric patients, BDD subjects had higher scores on the depression, anxiety, and anger/hostility scales but not on the somatic/somatization scale. Scores on all scales significantly decreased with fluvoxamine. In conclusion, patients with BDD have markedly high levels of distress, are highly symptomatic, and have poor well-being in the domains of depression, anxiety, somatic symptoms, and anger-hostility. All of these symptoms significantly improved with fluvoxamine.
Keywordsbody dysmorphic disorder; depression; anxiety; hostility; somatic symptoms Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD), also known as dysmorphophobia, is a distressing and relatively common disorder (1-4). BDD frequently causes impaired functioning, such as social isolation and difficulties in occupational and academic functioning (1,2). Patients with BDD also have notably poor mental health-related quality of life (5) and high lifetime rates of psychiatric hospitalization (48%), suicidal ideation (45%-82%), and suicide attempts (22%-24%) (1,6). However, relatively little is known about non-BDD symptoms and well-being in patients with BDD.Regarding non-BDD symptoms in patients with this disorder, BDD pharmacotherapy studies have reported mild to moderate depressive symptoms on the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D) (7,8) and the MADRS (8). A report of patients who were treated with medication, intensive cognitive behavioral therapy, and rehabilitation in a residential treatment setting found that BDD patients had higher pre-treatment scores on the HAM-D and Hamilton Anxiety (HAM-A) scale than patients with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) treated in the same setting (9); BDD patients' HAM-A scores were in the moderate to severe range. In a small open-label BDD fluvoxamine study (n = 12) by Perugi and colleagues, on the self-report Hopkins Symptom Checklist-90, subjects reported that they were distressed by depression "moderately" to "quite a bit" and by anxiety "a little bit" to "moderately" (10). BDD patients also have elevated levels of perceived stress, with scores that are notably higher than those in a large national probability sample and in most normal, medical, and psychiatric samples (11).In this study, we assessed symptoms and well-being in the domains of depression, anxiety, somatic/somatization, and anger-hostility using ...