It is very difficult to diagnose bipolar disorder in a child. In particular, this is true because there are no unequivocal physical signs that indicate bipolar disorder illness.
There also is no specific test that your doctor can give to a child to determine if he is suffering from the disease. As far as testing is concerned, the best that he can do is to test for other diseases for which there are tests, and rule those diseases out, one by one, until bipolar disorder remains as the most likely cause of the child's mood swings.
As a result of these limitations, in order to help with his diagnosis, your physician will almost certainly desire to have a detailed health history of your family. Specifically he will be on the lookout for any kinds of mental problems in your family such as depression, manic activity, suicides, and the like. Sadly, getting an accurate diagnosis for your child could take a while.
Medical science has no cure for bipolar disorder at this current day and age. It can be treated, however. Therefore, if your child is diagnosed with bipolar disorder, their are many forms of treatments that your doctor can recommend.
In the history of bipolar disorder, it has only recently been recognized that children can suffer from bipolar disorder. And, in the majority of cases, when an adult is treated for the disease, prescribed medications is usually at the top of the list for treating the disease. But you have to be extremely careful when prescribing drugs to children, especially powerful drugs. This is because, your child's body is still developing. The last thing that you want is to interfere with his body's growth process by exposing him to some of these powerful drugs.
Secondly, although most of the prescribed drugs have been tested to a certain extent on adults, practically none of them have been tested extensively on children. And, finally, many of these drugs have side effects, such as weight gain or other more serious effects, that are not good for your kid.
So, when giving your kid drugs, the best approach is to work closely with your doctor to limit the amount of medication that you are giving to your child as well as monitoring the effects of the drugs on his body. And, once your child is on medication, never stop giving him the medication without your doctor's approval. Some drugs have powerful withdrawal symptoms which can trigger even worse bipolar disorder reactions in your kid.
In addition to prescribed medications, in many cases, therapy may be advised as well. Therapy won't cure the disease, but it can make it more manageable for the child. Therapy may involve the rest of the family as well. It can greatly help them in learning how to deal, as a group, with the disease and generally make life better for everyone in the family.