The Wide AmbispectiVE study of the clinical management and burden of bipolar disorder (BD) (WAVE-bd; NCT01062607) is ongoing to address limitations of longitudinal BD studies to-date focused on single disease phases or treatment.

To describe baseline bipolar mood state and severity in a cohort of patients with BD.

Multinational, multicentre, non-interventional, longitudinal study of patients diagnosed with BD-I or BD-II with ≥1 mood event in the preceding 12 months (retrospective data collection from index mood event to enrolment, followed by 9-14 months’ prospective follow-up). Site and patient selection provided a sample representative of bipolar populations. The study includes descriptive analyses of demographics, diagnosis and medical history.

2880 patients (mean age 46.5 years [SD: 13.3]; 62.0% female) were recruited March to September 2010: 1989 (69.1%) BD-I and 891 (30.9%) BD-II. Time (years) from first symptoms to diagnosis was 2.9 [SD: 6.6] (BD-I) and 4.4 [SD: 8.0] (BD-II). Of the total population, 20.8% lived alone (13.9% BD-I, 6.9% BD-II), 36.7% were employed (24.0% BD-I, 12.7% BD-II) and 13.3% unemployed (9.5% BD-I, 3.8% BD-II). Disease status at inclusion (BD-I, BD-II, respectively [mild, moderate, severe]) included hypomania (7.9% [67.7%, 31.0%, 1.3%], 6.5% [70.7%, 29.3%, 0%]), mania (7.1% [26.1%, 47.2%, 26.8%], 0%), euthymia (58.6%, 60.3%), depression (19.7% [38.8%, 47.7%, 13.5%], 31.1% [41.2%, 46.9%, 11.9%]) and mixed (5.7% [30.1%, 46.9%, 23.0%], 0%).

This ongoing study provides detailed insight into a large BD population, showing the majority with euthymia and an important proportion with depression both in BD-I and BD-II patients.