How to Tell If Your Health Concerns Are Normal —Or a Sign of Something More

Is that sniffle a sign of seasonal allergies or COVID-19? It’s a question you’ve likely asked yourself at least once—and perhaps lots of times—over the last few years. Especially during a pandemic, it’s normal to analyze your health. But for some people, those thoughts can cross a line into more problematic territory. At least 4% of the U.S. population lives with what’s known as health anxiety, or an excessive preoccupation with health and illness—and symptoms of the condition may have emerged or worsened for certain people during these virus-dominated recent years, experts say. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “Health anxiety, to a certain extent, is normal during the pandemic,” says Michelle Patriquin, director of research at the Menninger Clinic, a mental health treatment center in Texas. In 2013, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders retired the term “hypochondriasis,” which many people found belittling and inadequate. Since then, health anxiety has been formally known as “illness anxiety disorder” and is characterized by excessive worry about having or developing a serious disease, often even if tests don’t show anything wrong. People with this condition frequently become fixated on mild or routine physical sensations—fearing that a headache could be an early sign of a brain tumor, for example. Health anxiety overlaps with obsessive-compulsive disorde...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized healthscienceclimate Mental Health Source Type: news