Geriatric Depression Research Paper

Depression is one of the most recurrently investigated psychological disorders within the area of medical R&D (Montorio & Izal, 1996). A number of exhaustive researches have been carried out to study its symptoms and impacts on different patients belonging to different personal and professional attributes and most of these researchers depicted that depression in the elderly people is very frequent and in spite of number of researches in this context, it is often undiagnosed or untreated. To add to this jeopardy, it has also been estimated that only 10% out of the total depressed elderly individuals receive proper diagnosis and treatment (Holroyd et al, 2000). And for that reason, an authentic

I worked in a long term care facility for three years before going to an internal medicine office. When starting right away I noticed, with my medication passes, that most of the residents were on some type on medication for depression or a mood disorder. I started to think that it must be a common diagnosis for most of these patients because of being in a nursing facility instead of living at home, in which they had been staying most of their adult lives. I then began to think of some of the residents that where immobile and couldn’t ingest orally anymore and would have to rely on internal feedings to keep them alive. It was hard to image how they must have felt. I could see the emotional impact that it had on them losing their ability to

Depression is a very prevalent mental disorder that many people have in the world. Depression can be termed as consistently depressed mood or loss of interest in activities that result in an impairment in daily functioning. Depression can be characterized by hopelessness, and a pessimistic view of the world. People who suffer with depression should take act immediately in receiving help because they could possibly commit suicide and or poor health outcomes. Many older adults who receive help are more than likely to reduce the severity of depression. Also, older adults that receive help by using evidence based practice from their clinicians

There are many areas of overlap between dementia and depression. The most patients don’t report on depressive symptoms by patients with dementia and the co-occurrence of some symptoms such as sadness, apathy, loss appetite and loss of interest in both disorders. Depression has different causes and common to people of all ages, including biological factors, malnutrition, abnormal changes in the brain, stressful situation, social isolation and drug and alcohol use. Older adults may experience depression due to illness, side effects of the drugs, and major life changes such as: losing relatives and retirement. The same changes may lead to dementia developing after depression occurs concurrently.

Mental disorders are becoming more prevalent in today's society as people add stress and pressure to their daily lives. The elderly population is not eliminated as a candidate for a disorder just because they may be retired. In fact, mental disorders affect 1 in 5 elderly people. One would think that with disorders being rather prevalent in this age group that there would be an abundance of treatment programs, but this is not the case. Because the diagnosis of an individual's mental state is subjective in nature, many troubled people go untreated regularly (summer 1998). Depression in the elderly population is a common occurrence, yet the diagnosis and treatment seem to slip

The purpose of this research is to review factors that trigger elderly depression states, their physical and mental health conditions,

the last few month with shopping and cleaning. Mr Young scored 12/30 within the mini mental state examination (MMSE) and 6/15 within the Geriatric Depression Score. The Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) is a tool, generally used to test for memory or other abilities and it is only use by clinicians to assist in diagnose dementia and help to assess progression and severity. This contains series of questions and test, and patients are scored points if they answer correctly. It tests various mental abilities, including a person’s memory, attention and language (Alzheimer Society, 2015). Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) is recommended for screening older people during an admission into the hospital. Osborn et al (2002).

Typical presenting symptoms in older adults are weakness, insomnia, hypersomnia, headache, fatigue, irritability, chronic constipation, pain, agitation, and unintentional weight loss/change. Dementia and Delirium are also known to have higher rates of depression in older adults. The Geriatric Depression Scale, Cornell Scale for Depression in Dementia, and the nine item Patient Health Questionnaire are screening tools utilized when an older adult presents with signs and symptoms of depression (Downing, Caprio & Lyness, 2013).

Retirement is a vital experience in the life of an individual. Some older individuals enjoy leisure time after retirement. Working in stressful environments for decades can cause them to become tired and yearn to enjoy the rest of their lives with family and friends. However, retirement, death of a loved one, health problems, and other situations can create situations where one can become separated from social contacts. Retirement can have negative effects on physical and mental health. Mental disorders and other chronic diseases adversely affect one’s physical health and ability to function, especially in older adulthood.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, “older adults are at an increased risk of depression, because depression is more common in people who have other illnesses, and 80% of older adults have a chronic condition” (CDC, 2017). The CDC also mentions that older adults are often misdiagnosed or undertreated, because the symptoms may be thought to be the cause of something else, or the patient doesn’t understand that treatment would be beneficial and do not seek help.

The exosystem refers to a setting that does not involve the person as an active participant, but still affects them. This includes decisions that have bearing on the person, but in which they have no participation in the decision-making process. An example would be a child being affected by a parent receiving a promotion at work or losing their job.

According to the author, Depressive symptoms have been found to be common in older women. Several studies have demonstrated that various factors are associated with depressive symptoms in older adults , including advanced age (Demura & Sato, 2003; Reid & Planas, 2002), loss of spouse (MechakraTahiri et al., 2010; Nahcivan & Demirezen, 2005; Schulman et al., 2002), lower level of self-rated health status (Blay, Andreoli, Fillenbaum, & Gastal2007; Demura & Sato, 2003; Reid & Planas, 2002), and poorer physical health (Blay et al., 2007; Lai 2004).

Lavretsky, H., Altstein, L., Olmstead, R. E., Ercoli, L., Riparetti-Brown, M., St. Cyr, N., & Irwin, M. R. (2011). Complementary Use of Tai Chi Chih Augments Escitalopram Treatment of Geriatric Depression: A Randomized Controlled Trial. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry : Official Journal of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, 19(10), 839–850. http://doi.org/10.1097/JGP.0b013e31820ee9ef

At first I had some difficulty finding exactly what I was looking for. I wanted to research depression, one of the disorders the text discusses, but like the prompt instructed, find out how it effects older people differently. I found my source from the National Institute of Mental Health. They list three types of depression: major depression, persistent depressive disorder, and minor depression. Each is “less severe” than the previous. For example major depression displays symptoms that impact your work performance, level of concentration, sleep and eating patterns. It impacts these major, if not all, areas of life. Whereas, the symptoms of persistent depressive disorder aren’t nearly as debilitating, but can last up to two years.

Temporary sadness, grief, or blue moods is considered as normal. However, when these blue moods exist persistently for two or more weeks, it is classified as the depression. Therefore, assessing an older adult’s depression is a way to know their functional status. Geriatric Depression Scales originally had 30 questions and was a self-report assessment tool. It was then reduced to 15 questions due to the validity of these 15 questions. (Mitchell, Bird, Rizzo, & Meader, 2010). As aforementioned, the questions in the GDS were designed based on the signs and symptoms of depression. Iliades (2011) stated that depressed patients would have problems with motivation, fatigue, sleep patterns, suicidality or hopelessness. In GDS, the questions such as “do you feel full of energy” and “do you prefer to stay at home, rather than going out and doing new things?” are to assess the older adults motivation or fatigue. Moreover, the questions such as “do you feel pretty worthless the way you are now?”, “do you feel that your situation is hopeless?” or “Are you hopeful about the future?” are to assess the older adults’