Background: The socio-economic impact of bipolar disorder in the UK is unknown.
Aims: To estimate the annual socio-economic burden imposed by bipolar disorder on UK society.
Method: The annual cost of resource use attributable to managing bipolar disorder was calculated. Indirect societal costs were also calculated.
Results: The annual National Health Service (NHS) cost of managing bipolar disorder was estimated to be 199 million pounds sterling , of which hospital admissions accounted for 35%. The annual direct non-health-care cost was estimated to be 86 million pounds sterling annually and the indirect societal cost was estimated to be 1770 million pounds sterling annually.
Conclusions: The annual cost to UK society attributable to bipolar disorder was estimated to be 2 billion pounds sterling at 1999/2000 prices (estimated 297 000 people with the disorder). Ten per cent of this cost is attributable to NHS resource use, 4% to non-health-care resource use and 86% to indirect costs.