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Bereavement is one of life’s most disruptive and distressing experiences. The grief that ensues is not an illness but, rather, the manifestation of the adjustment process. This fact does not preclude the occurrence of psychiatric illness in the wake of bereavement. Clinicians need to recognize and support adaptive grief as well as diagnose and treat bereavement-related psychiatric conditions. The year 2008 saw publication of several studies that clarified how best to understand bereaved people.
Several studies in different populations indicate that most bereaved people never meet criteria for major depression, and that those who do should be treated like anyone else with a major depressive episode. In a study of 306 individuals with major de…