Condition : Panic disorder

Condition Panic disorder

What is panic disorder?

If you regularly experience sudden episodes of extreme stress (panic attacks), and often for no clear reason, you may have panic disorder.

Panic disorder is a type of anxiety disorder, which is when feelings of stress, fear, or worry become difficult to control and affect your everyday life.

During a panic attack, you will get a rush of intense mental and physical symptoms, such as:

faster, irregular, or more noticeable heartbeat (palpitations)
feeling faint or dizzy
nausea or being sick
breathlessness or a choking sensation
chest pain
trembling or shaking
hot flushes or chills
numbness or pins and needles
a feeling of dread or a fear of dying
feeling like you’re not connected to your body (dissociation)

Most panic attacks last between 5 and 20 minutes and won’t cause physical harm, although they are frightening. If you have panic disorder, the frequency of attacks can range from once or twice a month to several times a week.

Having a panic attack because of something that triggers a phobia does not mean you have panic disorder.

A phobia is a type of anxiety that can cause panic attacks. Phobias often start after a very upsetting or frightening experience, usually in childhood.

If you have a phobia, your panic attack is usually caused by a specific thing, such as an animal, object, place or situation. If you have panic disorder, panic attacks often happen without a clear reason.

After having a panic attack, some people start avoiding places or situations where they fear another attack might happen. This can look similar to a phobia.

It is common to have more than one type of anxiety disorder, so alongside panic disorder you could have:

generalised anxiety disorder (GAD) – often feeling very anxious about lots of different things
social anxiety disorder (also known as social phobia) – a fear of social situations
agoraphobia – a fear of being in situations, such as on a bus or in a crowd, where help or an easy escape might not be available

What causes panic disorder?

Anxiety disorders, such as panic disorder, trigger our ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ response which is designed to protect us in dangerous situations.

It’s not fully understood what causes anxiety disorders, though it’s believed that a mixture of things can trigger them, including:

an event that caused a lot of stress
genetics (having a close family member who has an anxiety disorder)
an imbalance of neurotransmitters (chemical messengers) in the brain

Some of the symptoms of panic attacks can also be symptoms of other problems, such as low blood pressure, so it’s important to let your GP know so they can run tests to make sure you get the right help.

Next steps

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