Association between childhood maltreatment and the clinical course of bipolar disorders: A survival analysis of mood recurrences

Objectives Childhood maltreatment, also referred as childhood trauma, increases the severity of bipolar disorders (BD). Childhood maltreatment has been associated with more frequent mood recurrences, however, mostly in retrospective studies. Since scarce, further prospective studies are required to identify whether childhood maltreatment may be associated with the time to recurrence in BD. Methods Individuals with BD (N = 2008) were assessed clinically and for childhood maltreatment at baseline, and followed up for two years. The cumulative probability of mood recurrence over time was estimated with the Turnbull’s extension of the Kaplan–Meier analysis for interval‐censored data, including childhood maltreatment as a whole, and then maltreatment subtypes as predictors. Analyses were adjusted for potential confounding factors. Results The median duration of follow‐up was 22.3 months (IQR:12.0–24.8). Univariable analyses showed associations between childhood maltreatment, in particular all types of abuses (emotional, physical, and sexual) or emotional neglect, and a shorter time to recurrence (all p