Mental Health & Psychiatry Abbreviations
100 abbreviations · part of Medical Abbreviations
Abbreviations for psychiatric and neurodevelopmental diagnoses, substance use disorders, symptoms recorded in risk assessments, screening scales, psychotherapies, medication side effects and treatment settings. Most diagnostic terms follow the American Psychiatric Association's DSM-5-TR, while British and international records often use ICD terms such as EUPD and BPAD. Several letters carry more than one psychiatric meaning (ASD, SAD, PD, PDD, ACT), and many also mean something unrelated elsewhere in medicine, so entries explain how to tell them apart.
| Abbreviation | Stands for | Description |
|---|---|---|
| 5150 | California Welfare and Institutions Code section 5150 (involuntary psychiatric hold) | California law allowing designated professionals and police to place a person who, because of a mental health disorder, is a danger to self or others or gravely… |
| ACEs | Adverse childhood experiences | Potentially traumatic events before age 18, including abuse, neglect and household challenges such as domestic violence, substance use, mental illness, parental… |
| ACT | Acceptance and commitment therapy | Form of psychotherapy that encourages people to accept difficult thoughts and feelings rather than fight them, to notice thoughts without being ruled by them, and to… |
| ADD | Attention deficit disorder | Former official name, used in DSM-III from 1980, for the condition now called ADHD. |
| ADHD | Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder | Neurodevelopmental disorder marked by persistent inattention, hyperactivity-impulsivity or both, beginning before age 12 and causing impairment in at least two settings… |
| AH | Auditory hallucinations | Hearing sounds or voices that others do not hear, without an external source. |
| AIMS | Abnormal Involuntary Movement Scale | Twelve-item clinician-rated exam that checks for involuntary movements of the face, lips, jaw, tongue, limbs and trunk, used to detect and monitor tardive dyskinesia in… |
| AN | Anorexia nervosa | Eating disorder characterized by restriction of food intake leading to significantly low body weight, intense fear of gaining weight and a disturbed perception of body… |
| AOT | Assisted outpatient treatment | Court-ordered community treatment for people with serious mental illness who have a history of hospitalization or violence linked to not following treatment. |
| ARFID | Avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder | Eating disorder in which a person avoids or restricts food because of sensory sensitivities, fear of choking or vomiting, or low interest in eating, not because of… |
| ASD | Autism spectrum disorder | Neurodevelopmental condition defined by persistent differences in social communication and interaction plus restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests or… |
| ASPD | Antisocial personality disorder | Personality disorder defined by a pervasive pattern of disregarding and violating the rights of others since age 15, including deceitfulness, impulsivity, aggression… |
| AUD | Alcohol use disorder | Substance use disorder involving a problematic pattern of drinking, such as drinking more than intended, failed attempts to cut down, craving, continued use despite… |
| AUDIT | Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test | Ten-question screening tool developed by the WHO that asks about drinking frequency, quantity, dependence symptoms and alcohol-related harm, giving a score from 0 to 40. |
| AWS | Alcohol withdrawal syndrome | Symptoms that develop when a person with physical alcohol dependence stops or sharply reduces drinking: tremor, sweating, anxiety, nausea and insomnia within 6–24… |
| BD | Bipolar disorder | Mood disorder featuring episodes of mania or hypomania, usually alternating with depression. |
| BDD | Body dysmorphic disorder | Preoccupation with one or more perceived flaws in physical appearance that are slight or not noticeable to others, accompanied by repetitive behaviors such as mirror… |
| BDI | Beck Depression Inventory | Widely used 21-item self-report questionnaire that measures the severity of depressive symptoms, such as sadness, loss of pleasure, guilt, sleep changes and fatigue… |
| BED | Binge eating disorder | The most common eating disorder in the US, defined by recurrent episodes of eating unusually large amounts of food with a sense of loss of control, at least weekly for… |
| BH | Behavioral health | Umbrella term covering mental health, substance use and related behavior-driven conditions, used by insurers, health systems and integrated primary care programs. |
| BN | Bulimia nervosa | Eating disorder involving recurrent episodes of binge eating followed by compensatory behaviors such as self-induced vomiting, laxative misuse, fasting or excessive… |
| BPAD | Bipolar affective disorder | Name for bipolar disorder used in ICD-10 and common in British, Irish, Indian and Australian psychiatric records. |
| BPD | Borderline personality disorder | Personality disorder marked by instability in relationships, self-image and emotions, intense fear of abandonment, impulsivity, chronic emptiness, intense anger, and… |
| C-PTSD | Complex post-traumatic stress disorder | Diagnosis in the WHO's ICD-11 for people who meet criteria for PTSD and also have lasting problems with emotion regulation, a persistently negative self-concept and… |
| C-SSRS | Columbia Suicide Severity Rating Scale | Structured set of questions that assesses the presence and severity of suicidal ideation and behavior, available as a short screener and a full clinical version. |
| CAGE | Cut down, Annoyed, Guilty, Eye-opener (questionnaire) | Four-question alcohol screening tool asking whether a person has felt they should Cut down, been Annoyed by criticism of their drinking, felt Guilty about drinking, or… |
| CBT | Cognitive behavioral therapy | Structured, time-limited form of talk therapy that helps people identify and change unhelpful patterns of thinking and behavior. |
| CD | Conduct disorder | Childhood or adolescent disorder involving a repetitive pattern of violating others' rights or major age-appropriate rules, including aggression toward people or… |
| CPT | Cognitive processing therapy | Trauma-focused psychotherapy for PTSD, usually 12 sessions, that helps patients examine and challenge "stuck points", beliefs about the trauma, themselves and the world… |
| CUD | Cannabis use disorder | Problematic pattern of cannabis use, such as craving, failed attempts to cut down, continued use despite problems and withdrawal symptoms like irritability, insomnia… |
| DBT | Dialectical behavior therapy | Comprehensive psychotherapy combining cognitive-behavioral techniques with mindfulness and acceptance, originally developed for chronically suicidal people with… |
| DID | Dissociative identity disorder | Disorder involving two or more distinct personality states or identities, with recurrent gaps in memory for everyday events, personal information or traumatic… |
| DMDD | Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder | Childhood disorder introduced in DSM-5 in 2013, defined by severe temper outbursts at least three times a week plus persistently irritable or angry mood between… |
| DSM-5 | Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition | The American Psychiatric Association's classification of mental disorders, setting out diagnostic criteria used by clinicians, researchers, insurers and courts… |
| DTs | Delirium tremens | Most severe form of alcohol withdrawal, usually beginning 48–96 hours after the last drink, with confusion, agitation, hallucinations, tremor, fever, rapid heart rate… |
| ECT | Electroconvulsive therapy | Treatment in which a brief, controlled seizure is induced with electrical current under general anesthesia and muscle relaxation, usually two or three times a week for… |
| ED | Eating disorder | Umbrella term for serious mental illnesses involving disturbed eating behaviors and related thoughts and emotions, including anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge… |
| EMDR | Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing | Structured psychotherapy for trauma in which a person recalls distressing memories while following side-to-side eye movements or other bilateral stimulation, such as… |
| EPS | Extrapyramidal symptoms | Drug-induced movement disorders caused mainly by dopamine-blocking medications such as antipsychotics and some antiemetics. |
| ERP | Exposure and response prevention | Behavioral therapy for obsessive-compulsive disorder in which patients deliberately face feared thoughts, objects or situations in gradual steps while refraining from… |
| EUPD | Emotionally unstable personality disorder | ICD-10 diagnosis, widely used in the UK, Ireland and other countries, covering the impulsive type and the borderline type of unstable mood, relationships and self-image. |
| GAD | Generalized anxiety disorder | Excessive, hard-to-control worry about many everyday matters, present more days than not for at least six months, with symptoms such as restlessness, fatigue, poor… |
| GAD-7 | Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-item scale | Seven-question screening and severity measure for anxiety, asking how often over the past two weeks a person has felt nervous, unable to stop worrying, restless or… |
| GAF | Global Assessment of Functioning | Numeric scale from 1 to 100 rating a person's overall psychological, social and occupational functioning, with higher scores indicating better functioning. |
| GD | Gender dysphoria | DSM-5 diagnosis describing clinically significant distress or impairment associated with a marked incongruence between a person's experienced gender and the sex… |
| HAM-D | Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression | Clinician-administered scale rating the severity of depression, most commonly in a 17-item version, used for decades as the standard outcome measure in antidepressant… |
| HI | Homicidal ideation | Thoughts about killing another person, assessed alongside suicidal ideation in psychiatric evaluations. |
| ID | Intellectual disability | Neurodevelopmental disorder with deficits in intellectual functions such as reasoning, problem solving and learning, together with deficits in adaptive functioning… |
| IED | Intermittent explosive disorder | Recurrent impulsive aggressive outbursts, verbal or physical, that are grossly out of proportion to any provocation and not premeditated, causing distress or legal and… |
| IOP | Intensive outpatient program | Structured mental health or substance use treatment that provides several hours of group and individual therapy a few days a week, often about 9–15 hours weekly, while… |
| IPT | Interpersonal psychotherapy | Time-limited psychotherapy, typically 12–16 weeks, that treats depression by focusing on current relationships and life events in one of four areas: grief, role… |
| IVC | Involuntary commitment | Legal process for admitting or holding a person for psychiatric evaluation or treatment against their will, generally when mental illness makes them dangerous to… |
| LAI | Long-acting injectable | Depot formulation that releases a drug slowly for weeks to months after a single injection, most often antipsychotics such as paliperidone palmitate, aripiprazole… |
| MAT | Medication-assisted treatment | Older and still widespread term for treating substance use disorders, especially opioid use disorder, with FDA-approved medications combined with counseling and… |
| MDD | Major depressive disorder | Mood disorder diagnosed when at least five of nine symptoms, including depressed mood or loss of interest, are present most of the day for at least two weeks and cause… |
| MDE | Major depressive episode | Period of at least two weeks meeting full criteria for depression, the building block for diagnosing major depressive disorder and one of the episodes that make up… |
| MH | Mental health | State of emotional, psychological and social well-being, and the field and services addressing mental illness. |
| MI | Motivational interviewing | Collaborative counseling style that helps people resolve ambivalence about change by drawing out their own reasons and commitment, rather than lecturing or confronting. |
| MOUD | Medications for opioid use disorder | Methadone, buprenorphine and extended-release naltrexone, the FDA-approved drugs that reduce opioid craving, withdrawal, overdose and death. |
| MPD | Multiple personality disorder | Former name, used in DSM-III from 1980, for the condition now called dissociative identity disorder. |
| MSE | Mental status examination | Structured description of a patient's current psychological state, the psychiatric counterpart of the physical exam. |
| NCD | Neurocognitive disorder | DSM-5 category for acquired decline in cognitive functions such as memory, attention, language or executive function. |
| NMS | Neuroleptic malignant syndrome | Rare, potentially fatal reaction to antipsychotics and other dopamine-blocking drugs, featuring high fever, "lead-pipe" muscle rigidity, altered mental status and… |
| NPD | Narcissistic personality disorder | Personality disorder characterized by grandiosity, a need for admiration and a lack of empathy, often with fragile self-esteem beneath the surface. |
| NSSI | Nonsuicidal self-injury | Deliberate damage to one's own body tissue without suicidal intent, such as cutting, burning or hitting, often used to relieve intense emotional distress. |
| OCD | Obsessive-compulsive disorder | Disorder of recurrent, unwanted intrusive thoughts, images or urges (obsessions) and repetitive behaviors or mental acts performed to reduce distress (compulsions)… |
| OCPD | Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder | Personality disorder characterized by a pervasive preoccupation with orderliness, perfectionism, rules and control at the expense of flexibility and efficiency. |
| ODD | Oppositional defiant disorder | Childhood disorder characterized by at least six months of angry or irritable mood, argumentative or defiant behavior toward authority figures, and vindictiveness… |
| OSFED | Other specified feeding or eating disorder | DSM-5 diagnosis for clinically significant eating disorders that do not meet full criteria for anorexia, bulimia or binge eating disorder. |
| OTP | Opioid treatment program | Federally certified clinic, regulated by SAMHSA under 42 CFR Part 8, that provides methadone and other medications for opioid use disorder with counseling and monitoring. |
| OUD | Opioid use disorder | Substance use disorder involving compulsive opioid use despite harm, including prescription opioids, heroin and illicitly manufactured fentanyl. |
| PANSS | Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale | Thirty-item clinician-rated scale assessing positive symptoms (such as delusions and hallucinations), negative symptoms (such as blunted affect and social withdrawal)… |
| PCIT | Parent-child interaction therapy | Behavioral therapy for young children, typically aged 2–7, with disruptive behavior, in which a therapist coaches the parent in real time through an earpiece while… |
| PCL-5 | PTSD Checklist for DSM-5 | Twenty-item self-report measure of PTSD symptoms over the past month, each rated 0–4 for a total of 0–80, developed by the US National Center for PTSD. |
| PD | Panic disorder | Recurrent unexpected panic attacks, sudden surges of intense fear with palpitations, shortness of breath, chest pain, dizziness or fear of dying, followed by at least a… |
| PDD | Persistent depressive disorder | Chronic depression lasting at least two years in adults (one year in children and adolescents), with depressed mood on most days plus symptoms such as poor appetite… |
| PE | Prolonged exposure therapy | Trauma-focused psychotherapy for PTSD that helps patients gradually approach trauma memories and avoided situations through repeated imaginal retelling and real-life… |
| PHP | Partial hospitalization program | Day treatment program providing hospital-level mental health or substance use services, typically 5–6 hours a day, five days a week, with patients returning home each… |
| PHQ-2 | Patient Health Questionnaire-2 | Two-question depression screen asking how often in the past two weeks a person has had little interest or pleasure in doing things and felt down, depressed or hopeless. |
| PHQ-9 | Patient Health Questionnaire-9 | Nine-item self-report questionnaire that screens for depression and measures severity over the past two weeks, scoring 0–27. |
| PMDD | Premenstrual dysphoric disorder | Severe form of premenstrual syndrome classified as a depressive disorder, with marked irritability, mood swings, depressed mood or anxiety in the week before… |
| PND | Postnatal depression | British and Commonwealth term for postpartum depression, used by the NHS, health visitors and NICE guidance. |
| PPD | Postpartum depression | Depression occurring during pregnancy or after childbirth, more severe and longer lasting than the common "baby blues". |
| PTSD | Post-traumatic stress disorder | Mental health condition that can follow exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury or sexual violence, with intrusive memories or nightmares, avoidance of… |
| RAD | Reactive attachment disorder | Rare disorder of young children who experienced severe neglect or frequent changes of caregiver, in which the child rarely seeks or responds to comfort and shows… |
| SA | Suicide attempt | Self-injurious act with at least some intent to die, whether or not injury results. |
| SAD | Seasonal affective disorder | Pattern of depression that recurs at the same time each year, usually beginning in fall or winter and lifting in spring, with low energy, oversleeping, carbohydrate… |
| SBIRT | Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment | Public health approach for identifying and addressing risky alcohol and drug use in primary care, emergency departments and trauma centers. |
| SCZ | Schizophrenia | Chronic psychotic disorder with hallucinations, delusions, disorganized thinking, negative symptoms such as reduced motivation and emotional expression, and cognitive… |
| SI | Suicidal ideation | Thoughts about, considering or planning suicide, ranging from passive wishes to be dead to active thoughts with a specific plan and intent. |
| SIB | Self-injurious behavior | Repetitive self-directed harmful behaviors such as head banging, hand biting, scratching or hitting, used mainly in the context of autism, intellectual disability and… |
| SLD | Specific learning disorder | Neurodevelopmental disorder involving persistent difficulty learning academic skills such as reading, writing or mathematics, well below what is expected for age… |
| SMI | Serious mental illness | Mental, behavioral or emotional disorder in an adult that causes serious functional impairment substantially limiting one or more major life activities, a definition… |
| SUD | Substance use disorder | Problematic pattern of using alcohol, drugs or other substances leading to significant impairment or distress, diagnosed with 11 DSM-5 criteria covering impaired… |
| TD | Tardive dyskinesia | Involuntary, repetitive movements, often of the mouth, tongue and face (lip smacking, tongue protrusion, grimacing), that develop after months or years of exposure to… |
| TF-CBT | Trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy | Evidence-based therapy for children and adolescents with trauma-related symptoms that involves both the young person and a caregiver. |
| TMS | Transcranial magnetic stimulation | Noninvasive brain stimulation using a magnetic coil placed against the scalp to induce electrical currents in targeted brain regions, typically the left prefrontal… |
| TRD | Treatment-resistant depression | Major depression that has not responded adequately to at least two antidepressant trials of adequate dose and duration. |
| VH | Visual hallucinations | Seeing things that are not present, from simple flashes to complex people or animals. |
| Y-BOCS | Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale | Clinician-rated scale that measures the severity of obsessions and compulsions, scoring time occupied, interference, distress, resistance and control for each, for a… |
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