The patient has trouble controlling these feelings. I disorder do not provide the focus of the anxiety and worry. The symptoms cause clinically important distress or impair work, social or personal functioning. The disorder is not directly caused by a general medical condition or by substance use, including medications and drugs of abuse. It does not occur only during a Mood Disorder , Psychotic Disorder, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder or Pervasive Developmental Disorder.
Some disorders have similar or even the same symptoms.
The clinician, therefore, in his diagnostic attempt has to differentiate against the following disorders which he needs to rule out to establish a precise diagnosis. GAD may be caused by both biological and psychological factors. The presence of GAD has previously been linked to abnormalities in a number of different brain chemicals, particularly those known to be associated with fear and emotional responses. Moreover, the symptoms of GAD appear to worsen during periods of stress. Although some studies have reported that GAD runs in families, others have not found this connection.