Auditory verbal hallucinations in bipolar disorder & the schizophrenia spectrum

1. Auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH) are most commonly associated with schizophrenia, but also
occur in other psychiatric conditions, including bipolar disorder during manic or depressive
episodes. Despite this, the phenomenology of AVH in bipolar disorder has received little attention.
We conducted a scoping review to identify and synthesise existing empirical studies describing the
phenomenological characteristics of AVH in bipolar disorder. A systematic search was performed in
MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, and PsycINFO. Ten studies met inclusion criteria and were
included in the review.
In this seminar, I will present the main phenomenological dimensions of AVH identified in bipolar
disorder and discuss similarities and differences compared to the phenomenology of voices in
schizophrenia. 2. An important issue concerns the time lag between the onset of voices and their disclosure to others. It
seems that the auditive verbal hallucinations do not arise from nothing but are preceded and accompanied
by the anomalies of subjective experiences. The disclosure of AVH typically happened when patients reach
a point of profound subjective suffering or dysfunction in life, often several years after their beginning. The
purpose of this presentation Is to examine this topic from empirical and clinical perspectives and to explore
why it is so difficult for the clinicians to ask the patients about these experiences.