Communicating with Depressed Elderly Patients Essay

Communicating with Depressed Elderly Patients - Essay Example Because of these painful losses for the elderly, suicide rates among the aged were continuously increasing, but symptoms of depression are seldom recognized and treated in this vulnerable population. It could be then that out of ten older people only one receives treatment for their depression and the rest are ignored (Ainsworth, 2000, 37). According to the Epidemiologic Catchment Area Study (ECA) funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (U.S.) in the latter part of the 1980s, depressive indications take place in more or less 15 per cent of people over sixty five years of age. At the minimum, 3 per cent of older people endure severe depression, particularly those who live in nursing homes, where the incidences of depression are higher than the average 15 per cent (ibid, 37). Sadly, depressed elderly people spending the remaining days of their lives in nursing homes may appear to be whiners and be given no treatment for their miserable condition. Their depression are concealed since the actual nature of the sickness is masked behind a shroud of physical grumbles, or else the elderly person keeps away from interpreting the symptoms for anxiety of being called insane. Elderly patients generally endure mild memory lapses and dawdling mental activities, both circumstances resulting from physical causes. As soon as depression develops beyond this mild brain dysfunction, the outcome frequently appears to be an advanced case of dementia or â€Å"old-timer’s disease† (Cohen, 1990, 26), for which the mournful family believes there is no possibility to be treated. However, with proper diagnosis and therapeutic procedures for the treatment of serious depression, elderly patients often get rid of the symptoms of this pseudo-dementia and experience prog ress in both brain processes and quality of existence (ibid). For diverse causes, different cultures have begun to witness a remarkable boost in the need for family members to become concerned in