I think it is not only important to know your diagnosis but for your doc to explain it to you. If you can look it up in the DSM and be satisfied with the answer then you are fine. But if you have ANY questions your doc should be more than willing to answer them.

I met a woman once who was diagnosed with bipolar who was all freaked out about it. It turned out the reason she was freaked out was that her doctor never discussed her diagnosis with her, and it was only by reading her form that she found out she was diagnosed bipolar. The part that freaked her out though was that she had no idea wha bipolar disorder was! No idea what that meant or what kind of impact that meant on her life. After talking about it for several days she was able to understand the illness as opposed to just having a label stuck on her. She really didn't have very much fear at all regarding the illness, it was the unknown diagnosis that scared her. IMO that was a pretty poor lapse from the doctor / administrative staff. I hope it was just an error on their part and not their regular practice.