An estimated 3 million Americans have a little-understood and potentially disabling illness called panic disorder and few are receiving the treatment they need, the National Institute of Mental Health reported.
”Most people never have heard of this disabling condition,” Alan I. Leshner, acting director of the institute, said recently in announcing a three-year campaign to inform the public about the disorder.
Symptoms include feelings of terror, heart palpitations, difficulty in breathing, profuse sweating and tingling or numbness, said Dr. Frederick G. Goodwin, administrator of the Alcohol, Drug Abuse and Mental Health Administration, parent agency of the institute.
Women are twice as likely as men to develop the disorder, the institute said.and 20 percent had attempted suicide.
A pamphlet on the disorder may be obtained by writing to Panic Disorder, Pueblo, Colo. 81009.
