Severe mental illnesses (SMIs) refer to individuals with psychological problems that are so debilitating that their ability to engage in functional and occupational activities is severely impaired. In keeping with the literature (John et al., 2018), SMIs are divided into three categories:

1. Schizophrenia: Include schizophrenia, schizotypal and delusional disorders.

2. Bipolar disorder and other mood related disorders: Include bipolar disorder, manic depressive episodes with psychotic symptoms.

3. Other psychotic disorders and severe mental illnesses.

This phenotype excludes organic psychoses (e.g., drug and alcohol induced) and psychoses with origins in childhood.

Read code, SNOMED CT and ICD-10 definitions

Details about each of these definitions can be found in the respective phenotypes for schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and other mood related disorders, and other psychotic disorders and severe mental illnesses.

References

Economou, A., Grey, M., McGregor, J., Craddock, N., Lyons, R. A., Owen, M. J., ... & Lloyd, K. (2012). The health informatics cohort enhancement project (HICE): using routinely collected primary care data to identify people with a lifetime diagnosis of psychotic disorder. BMC Research Notes, 5, 1-6.

McGregor, J., Brooks, C., Chalasani, P., Chukwuma, J., Hutchings, H., Lyons, R. A., & Lloyd, K. (2010). The Health Informatics Trial Enhancement Project (HITE): Using routinely collected primary care data to identify potential participants for a depression trial. Trials, 11, 1-6.

Implementation

Information on algorithm construction are included in the following papers (Economou et. al. 2012; McGregor et. al. 2010).

References

John, A., McGregor, J., Jones, I., Lee, S. C., Walters, J. T., Owen, M. J., ... & Lloyd, K. (2018). Premature mortality among people with severe mental illness—New evidence from linked primary care data. Schizophrenia research, 199, 154-162.