Health Anxiety Flag
PT: Health Anxiety Flag /END PT
ID: a flag with nine horizontal lines of the same sizes. Their colors are, from top to bottom, dark grey, grey, dark red, red, light grey, red, dark red, grey and dark grey. In the center of the flag there is a black cross. END ID
Health Anxiety (HA): an anxiety disorder marked by an obsessive and irrational worry about having a serious medical condition. This condition is marked by a person's imagination of physical symptoms of illness. It is often characterized by fears that minor bodily or mental symptoms may indicate a serious illness, constant self-examination and self-diagnosis, and a preoccupation with one's body.
HA is categorized as a somatic amplification disorder—a disorder of "perception and cognition"—that involves a hyper-vigilance of situation of the body or mind and a tendency to react to the initial perceptions in a negative manner that is further debilitating. HA manifests in many ways.
For exemple, a person with health anxiety who would feel their left arm numbed would think that it might be a heart attack or a stroke. A person with health anxiety who would feel some pain in their head would think that they might have a brain cancer. A person who has a minor cough may think that they have tuberculosis.
HA is also called hypochondria, hypochondriasis, illness anxiety disorder, somatic symptom disorder.