Search results for ‘Subject term:"older people"’ Sort:
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Risky business?
- Author:
- NEUBERGER Julia
- Journal article citation:
- Community Care, 7.04.05, 2005, pp.36-37.
- Publisher:
- Reed Business Information
The author argues that social care professionals are erring on the side of caution with risk assessments as we live in an increasingly fear-driven system; particularly in the case of mental health workers. Highlights the problem and the effect it may have on older people's services as demographics change.
Persecutory symptoms and perceptual disturbance in a community sample of older people: the Islington study
- Authors:
- LIVINGSTON G., et al
- Journal article citation:
- International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 16(5), May 2001, pp.462-468.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Describes a study in Islington, an inner London borough. Residents aged 65 or over were interviewed at home. The Short-CARE was used to elicit psychiatric symptoms and diagnosis. Sociodemographic particulars were elicited using the Client Sociodemographic and Service Receipt Inventory. Questions were asked regarding sight and hearing. Subsections of the geriatric mental scale were used to identify people who had paranoid symptoms and perceptual disturbance (PDD). 720 people were interviewed. Twenty-eight (3.9%) participants scored positively on the PPD sub-scales of the GMS. Analysis found the significant independent predictors were dementia, drinking alcohol in last 6 months, drinking alcohol to help sleep, subjective memory loss and uncorrected visual impairment. Concludes that there is a relatively high prevalence of PPD in older people living in the community. This is not associated with higher use of services despite the increased needs. Further studies should consider interventions to meet this unmet need.
The impact of domestic abuse for older women: a review of the literature
- Authors:
- McGARRY Julie, SIMPSON Chris, HINCHLIFF-SMITH Kathryn
- Journal article citation:
- Health and Social Care in the Community, 19(1), January 2011, pp.3-14.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
The UK has an ageing population, and emerging national policy initiatives are beginning to recognise domestic abuse as an issue for older women. As such, it is fundamental that health and social care professionals are able to both identify domestic abuse and understand the particular experiences and needs of older women affected by domestic abuse. This literature review aimed to: provide a comprehensive summary of the impact of domestic abuse for older women particularly within the context of health; to explore the particular barriers to recognition and reporting abuse; and to highlight the particular gaps in our knowledge and understanding from a policy and care provision perspective. Overall findings showed that, while research in this area may be scarce, the work that has been undertaken to date would suggest that domestic abuse is both a significant and an under-recognised phenomenon with a wide-ranging impact on the lives and health of older women. Findings also suggest that older women’s experiences of domestic abuse are distinctly different from those in younger age groups and that these differences have not been adequately acknowledged.
Mental health status of home care elders in Michigan
- Authors:
- LI Lydia W., CONWELL Yeates
- Journal article citation:
- Gerontologist, 47(4), August 2007, pp.528-534.
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
This study describes the mental health status of community-living frail elders in Michigan and identifies subgroups of individuals who are vulnerable to mental health problems. The study analyzed the baseline assessment data collected from older adults who were admitted to two community-based long-term-care programs in Michigan (N = 18,939). The programmes aim to help adults at risk of nursing home placement to remain in the community by providing them with supportive services. Results show that 40.5% of the individuals in the sample have recognized mental disorders, 39.6% use psychotropic medications, 24.5% have probable depression, and 1.4% have self-injury thoughts or attempts. Frail elders who are White, younger, and female - as well as those who experience more pain, disease burden, cognitive impairment, and limitations in instrumental activities of daily living - are more prone to psychological distress. Mental health care is greatly needed by community-living frail elders.
Physical health and mental disorder in elderly suicide: a case-control study
- Authors:
- PRÉVILLE Michel, et al
- Journal article citation:
- Aging and Mental Health, 9(6), November 2005, pp.576-584.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
The psychological autopsy method was used to study 95 cases of suicide. Ninety-five comparison subjects matched for gender, age, region, and date of death were selected from the death register. This study showed that suicide cases did not differ from controls with regard to the number of chronic health problems and, compared to the suicide cases, the controls had less functional autonomy six months prior to death. If minor and sub-threshold depression cases were included, 74.7% of the suicide cases would have been considered as having a mental health disorder compared to 12.6% in the control group. When the effect of other co-variables were controlled for, multivariate analysis showed that suicide cases and controls did not differ according to marital status, education, income, and living arrangement. Furthermore, suicide cases were no more likely than controls to seldom meet with family members or friends or to have been isolated during the six-month period preceding their death. Our findings suggest that detection of psychiatric disorders, mainly depression, must be included in late life suicide prevention strategies.
Differences in suicide behaviour in the elderly: a study in two provinces of Northern Italy
- Authors:
- ZEPPEGNO P., et al
- Journal article citation:
- International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 20(8), August 2005, pp.769-775.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
This study investigates the suicide phenomenon among older people (people aged 65 and over) in the Italian provinces of Novara and Verbania, in the time span between January 1990 and December 2000, in order to evaluate if the characteristics of the suicide behaviour correlate to the place of living with particular attention to the psychosocial factors. The information was collected from the Republic Procuration of the two provinces. Frequencies and contingency tables were evaluated to compare the data found in the two provinces. Standardised Mortality Ratios (SMRs) with their confidential intervals (95% confidence intervals) were calculated in comparison with the average suicide rates in North West Italy in the same period and in the same age group. One hundred and eighty-four suicides were committed from the elderly, with an average rate of 14.07 per 100,000 inhabitants in Novara and 25.56 in Verbania. The most common methods used to commit suicide were hanging and jumping from height. The factors chiefly related to suicide were mental disease, followed by organic illness. The analysis of SMRs point out that the incidence of suicide in the province of Verbania is higher than in North West Italy while in Novara it is lower. The evaluation of the suicide risk in the elderly in a diagnostic and preventive framework must take into consideration the psychosocial factors that vary with the place of living.
What should you expect at your age?
- Authors:
- MANTHORPE Jill, ILIFFE Steve
- Journal article citation:
- Openmind, 132, March 2005, pp.6-8.
- Publisher:
- MIND
Discusses complaints of gross neglect of mental health services for older people and an alleged national scandal of ignoring their heightened suicide risk are often heard, asking what is going on and why such services are still seen as the Cinderella. Asks how things might be improved by the voluntary sector, drawing on its experiences and critical perspectives.
Tea consumption is associated with cognitive impairment in older Chinese adults
- Authors:
- GU Jing-Jie, et al
- Journal article citation:
- Aging and Mental Health, 22(9), 2018, pp.1232-1238.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
Objective: To explore the association between tea consumption and cognitive impairment (CoI).Methods: 4579 adults (≥60 years) from the Weitang Geratric Diseases Study were assessed for characteristics of tea consumption and cognitive function by administering questionnaires and the Abbreviated Mental Test (AMT), respectively. We divided the subjects into normal cognitive function group (AMT score ≥8) and CoI group (AMT score ≤7). The association between tea consumption and risk of CoI was determined by logistic regression models. Results: The least-squared means of the AMT scores for the subjects who seldom consumed tea were less favorable than those who habitually consumed tea. An inverse association was found between tea consumption (of any type) and prevalence of CoI (odds ratio = 0.74, 95% confidence interval = 0.57–0.98, P = 0.032). Interestingly, the protective correlation of tea was more obvious in never smokers (odds ratio = 0.63), but vanished in current/former smokers (odds ratio = 1.10). In never smokers, frequency of tea consumption was significantly associated with CoI (P for trend = 0.010). Conclusion: Habitual tea consumption is suggested to be associated with a decreased risk of CoI among elders in Suzhou, and a higher frequency of tea consumption was associated with a lower prevalence of CoI among never smokers. (Publisher abstract)
Frailty and incident depression in community-dwelling older people: results from the ELSA study
- Authors:
- VERONESE Nicola, et al
- Journal article citation:
- International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 32(12), 2017, pp.e141-e149.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Objective: Frailty and pre-frailty are two common conditions in the older people, but whether these conditions could predict depression is still limited to a few longitudinal studies. In this paper, we aimed to investigate whether frailty and pre-frailty are associated with an increased risk of depression in a prospective cohort of community-dwelling older people. Methods: Four thousand seventy-seven community-dwelling men and women over 60 years without depression at baseline were included from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. Frailty status was defined according to modified Fried's criteria (weakness, weight loss, slow gait speed, low physical activity and exhaustion) and categorized as frailty (≥3 criteria), pre-frailty (1–2 criteria) or robustness (0 criterion). Depression was diagnosed as ≥4 out of 8 points of Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale, after 2 years of follow-up. Results: Over a 2-year follow-up, 360 individuals developed depression. In a logistic regression analysis, adjusted for 18 potential baseline confounders, pre-frailty (odds ratio (OR) = 0.89; 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.54–1.46; p = 0.64) and frailty (OR = 1.22; 95% CI, 0.90–1.64; p = 0.21) did not predict the onset of depression at follow-up. Among the criteria included in the frailty definition, only slow gait speed (OR = 1.82; 95% CI, 1.00–3.32; p = 0.05) appeared to predict a higher risk of depression. Conclusions: Among older community dwellers, frailty and pre-frailty did not predict the onset of depression during 2 years of follow-up, when accounting for potential confounders, whilst slow gait speed considered alone may predict depression in the older people. (Publisher abstract)
Aging perceptions and self-efficacy mediate the association between personality traits and depressive symptoms in older adults
- Authors:
- O'SHEA D.M., DOTSON V.M., FIEO R.A.
- Journal article citation:
- International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 32(12), 2017, pp.1217-1225.
- Publisher:
- Wiley
Objective: Personality traits have been shown to be predictors of depressive symptoms in late life. The authors examined whether other more modifiable sources of individual differences such as self-efficacy and self-perceptions of ageing would mediate the association between personality traits and depressive symptoms in older adults. Method: Data were obtained from 3,507 older adult participants who took part in the 2012 Health and Retirement Study. The “Big Five” personality traits, self-efficacy, ageing perceptions, and depressive symptoms were assessed. Mediation analyses tested the hypothesis that self-efficacy and ageing perceptions would mediate the relationship between personality traits and depressive symptoms. Results: All five personality traits were significant predictors of depressive symptoms. Neuroticism was positively associated with depressive symptoms and had the greatest effect compared with the other personality traits. There was a significant indirect effect of neuroticism, extraversion, and conscientiousness on depressive symptoms (including both mediators). The mediating effect of ageing perceptions on the relationship between neuroticism and depressive symptoms was the strongest compared with self-efficacy, accounting for approximately 80% of the total indirect effect. Conclusion: The authors results provide support for interventions aimed at improving self-perceptions related to efficacy and ageing in order to reduce depressive symptoms in older adults. (Edited publisher abstract)