About one in three people has a panic attack over the course of a year, and three to six million Americans will suffer from full-blown panic disorder at some time in their lives. You're likeliest to develop the condition between the ages of 15 and 25, but it can arise at any age. Twice as many women as men are affected by panic disorder, and people with asthma are also at higher risk of getting the disorder. Panic attacks can happen anyplace and anytime, even while you're sleeping. It's also common to feel that you're having a heart attack, going insane, or even dying during one of these attacks.
Some people have a sense of great danger or feel an urge to escape.
If you have panic attacks four times in a month, experts say, there's a good chance you've got panic disorder. Researchers aren't sure, although heredity, brain chemistry, and the way you handle stressful situations all appear to play a role. They point out that key parts of this system, including the hippocampus and the locus coeruleus, seem to go into overdrive during panic attacks. It isn't clear, though, whether this overactivity causes panic symptoms or shows up as a result of them. Other researchers think the culprit is probably an oversensitive amygdala, the part of the brain that controls the way you learn to respond unconsciously to signals from the outside world.