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"The changes to the manual will help clinicians more precisely identify mental disorders and improve diagnosis while maintaining the continuity of care," commented DSM-5 Task Force Chair David Kupfer, M.D. "We expect these changes to help clinicians better serve patients and to deepen our understanding of these disorders based on new research." Among those changes are a new chapter organization that shows how mental disorders may relate to one another based on underlying vulnerabilities or symptom characteristics. In addition, in DSM-5 disorders are organized in the context of age—that is, along a developmental lifespan within each chapter—as well as gender and cultural expectations. While the number of disorders are about the same as in the last edition of DSM, several new disorders have been added, including binge eating disorder, disruptive mood dysregulation disorder, and hoarding disorder. A new section for the manual, Section III, describes several conditions that warrant more research before they can be considered as formal disorders in the main part of the manual.
APA says that it will make the process of revising the manual in the future more responsive to research breakthroughs via incremental updates until a new edition is required. Thus, diagnosis guidelines won't be tied to a static publication but to scientific advances.
DSM-5 and its supplementary publications can be ordered at www.psychiatry.org/dsm5. More information about the manual is also available on the site.