Interval between symptom onset and hospitalization in mania.

Previous studies of illness onset in mania lack a frequency distribution for the interval between symptom onset and hospitalization (hospital latency), although a bimodal distribution of illness onset been suggested. We identified 100 patients hospitalized for mania and found a unimodal distribution, with mean +/- SD of 3.3 +/- 3.2 weeks for hospital latency. Cases with short hospital latency (< 1 week, n = 15) were younger and had briefer psychiatric histories. The data were compared to other studies of hospital latency in mania.