The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) is a catalogue of mental disorders used by doctors (including psychiatrists), psychologists, and other mental health workers, as well as insurance companies, to classify individuals with diagnosable mental disorders. The DSM is updated and the letters following DSM denote which update is being referred to. The most recent DSM is the DSM-IV-TR.
The benefit of a text like the DSM is that it gives people a common language (albeit a language that is clinical and sometimes difficult to follow). There are many potential problems with the DSM, not least of which is that it can be considered to be the “final word” or offering objective facts regarding mental health. In reality the content of the DSM is subject to cultural and historical influences, and what is now considered a mental illness may not be considered one at a later date. A good recent example of this is homosexuality, which was considered a mental illness until it was removed from the DSM in 1973.
