A brief summary of important activities in the development of DSM-5, from the initial planning stages and leading up to today, are found below:

1999-2007: Development of DSM-5 Research Planning white papers, including “A Research Agenda for the DSM-V” (2002, American Psychiatric Association) and “Age and Gender Considerations in Psychiatric Diagnosis: A Research Agenda for the DSM-V” (published in August 2007) and ”Religious and Spiritual Issues in Psychiatric Diagnosis: A Research Agenda for DSM-V” (in press)

 

2004-2007: “The Future of Psychiatric Diagnosis: Refining the Research Agenda” APA/NIH/WHO global research planning conferences. “Phase 2: Refining the Research Agenda for DSM-5: NIH Conference Series”

 

April 2006: Drs. David Kupfer and Darrel Regier are appointed as chair and vice-chair, respectively, of the DSM-5 Task Force. Other key appointments included Dr. William Narrow, Research Director, and Dr. Maritza Rubio-Stipec, Statistics and Methods Director.

 

July 2007: DSM-5 Work Group Chairs are appointed. Assembling of DSM-5 Work Groups begins.

 

May 2008: DSM-5 Work Group members announced. APA Names DSM-5 Work Group Members.

The DSM-5 Task Force and Work Group members have spent much of the last two years formulating their proposed draft criteria. This includes conducting literature reviews, performing secondary data analyses, and soliciting feedback from colleagues and other advisors. Although DSM-5 will not be published until 2013, the revision experts have several important tasks ahead of them in finalizing the development of this volume. Below is a summary of the DSM-5 timeline leading up to the May 2013 deadline.

January– May 2010: Site Recruitment for Field Trial Testing. Recruitment of sites for conducting the DSM-5 field trials, which will test the use of the proposed revisions in clinical and research settings, has begun. Proposed revisions will be examined in a variety of populations and in diverse settings.

 

February – May 2010: Pilot Testing for DSM-5 Field Trials. Results from pilot tests will be used to modify the design and implementation of the field trials.

 

May 2010 – March 2011: DSM-5 Field Trials, Phase 1. The first phase of DSM-5 field trials will begin in May 2010 and is scheduled to run for 10 months.

 

As the Phase 1 field trials are underway, members of the DSM-5 Task Force and Work Group will begin drafting their initial text for DSM-5. During this time, case studies will also be developed, which will be published after DSM-5’s release in a series of case books.

 

March – April 2011: Revisions to Proposed Criteria. Based on results from the first phase of field trials, the DSM-5 Task Force and Work Group members will make revisions to the proposed DSM-5 diagnostic criteria and dimensional measures. These revised criteria and measures will be tested in a second phase of field trials.

 

April – May 2011: Review of Revised Criteria. Revised proposed criteria will be subjected to internal review, including a review by the DSM-5 Task Force and Research Group and by other relevant work groups.

 

May-July 2011: Online Posting of Revised Criteria. Following the internal review, revised draft diagnostic criteria will be posted online for approximately one month to allow the public to provide feedback. This site will be closed for feedback by midnight on June 30, 2011.

 

August 2011 – February 2012: DSM-5 Field Trials, Phase II. The second phase of field trials testing will focus on those diagnostic criteria and dimensional measures that required modification based on the results of the Phase I field trials. This time period will include data collection and analysis.   

 

February – August 2012: Prepare Final Draft Text. The DSM-5 Task Force and Work Groups will prepare the final draft text and criteria for review.

 

March 2012: Presentation of DSM-5 Structure to APA’s Board of Trustees. The overall structure and organization of DSM-5, including diagnostic categories, category names, Axes, and location of major disorders, will be presented to the APA’s Board of Trustees in March 2012, leaving 9 months for any changes, edits, and subsequent reviews. Any revisions must be re-approved by September 2012 in time for the National Center for Vital and Health Statistics’ annual ICD-10-CM revision conference.

 

August 2012: Final Review. The APA will release the revised draft criteria to the APA Assembly and Board of Trustees for final review.

 

September 2012: The National Center for Vital and Health Statistics’ Annual ICD-10-CM Revision Conference. The final, approved overall structure of DSM-5 will be complete in time for this conference so that organization of ICD-10-CM can be aligned with DSM-5.

 

September – November 2012: Final Revisions to Draft Criteria. Work group members will make their last round of revisions to draft criteria based on feedback from APA’s Assembly and Board of Trustees.

November 2012: APA Assembly Approval of DSM-5.

 

December 2012: APA Board of Trustees Approval of DSM-5. Following approval from the Board of Trustees, the final completed manuscript will be submitted to the APA’s publishing division, American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc.

 

May 2013: Publication of DSM-5. The release of DSM-5 will take place during the APA’s 2013 Annual Meeting in San Francisco, CA.