abstract
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Onset-age is a stable characteristic of bipolar disorder (BPD) patients of clinical and probable psychobiological importance, but large pooled clinical samples from multiple sites employing modern diagnostic criteria to quantify onset-age remain rare.We pooled diagnostic, demographic, and clinical data from 1566 BPD patients from six international sites (5 European, 1 US) to compare onset-ages in subgroups.Median+/-IQR onset in 1090 BP-I patients was 5.8 years younger than 476 BP-II cases (24.3+/-18.3 vs. 30.1+/-13.8 years; p<0.0001). Onset-age ranked: [a] BP-I men (23.0+/-12.8); [b] BP-I women (26.0+/-14.2); [c] BP-II men (29.7+/-19.1); and [d] BP-II women (30.1+/-17.5 years. Juvenile-onset (