Manuale Diagnostico e Statistico dei Disturbi Mentali (DSM)

The American Psychiatric Association first published the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders or DSM in 1952 to standardize the classification of mental disorders.

The current edition, DSM-5, released in 2013, introduced significant updates. It added new disorders, such as gambling addiction, and revised diagnostic criteria. For instance, DSM-5 allows a diagnosis of somatic symptom disorder even when bodily symptoms have a medical explanation, unlike earlier versions that required no identifiable physical cause.

Each disorder in DSM-5 includes diagnostic features and criteria, prevalence rates, indicating the percentage of the population affected, and associated risk factors.

DSM-5 also highlights comorbidity, such as the 41% overlap between obsessive-compulsive disorder and major depressive disorder.

Critics claim DSM-5 has loosened diagnostic criteria, increasing the likelihood of overdiagnosis. For example, earlier editions excluded symptoms of depression during bereavement from a diagnosis. DSM-5 removed this exclusion, enabling normal grief to be diagnosed as a major depressive disorder.