Abstract

RODRIGUEZ BLANCO, Lidia; SOTOLONGO ARRO, Olga; LUBERTA NOY, Gladys  and  CALVO RODRIGUEZ, Marina. Behaviour of depression in the elderly at "Cristobal Labra" Polyclinic. Rev Cubana Med Gen Integr [online]. 2013, vol.29, n.1, pp.64-75. ISSN 0864-2125.

Background: depression in the elderly is a health problem. The biological, psychological, economic and social changes seen in the aging process, associated to some pathologies appearing in this stage of life, inevitably lead to think that the elderly have created all the conditions to be depressed. Objective: to characterize depression in the elderly and the treatments followed for this condition in the Psychogeriatric and Dementia consultation at a polyclinic. Methods: a retrospective descriptive cross-sectional study was performed in 112 elderly who were referred by their family doctors to the Psychogeriatric and Dementia consultation of "Cristobal Labra" Polyclinic from July to December 2011. The data were collected from medical records. For the diagnosis of the pathology, the Yesavage and the Folstein Mini Mental tests were applied. Results: depression was diagnosed in a 25 % of the elderly who were referred to the consultation. This condition increased with age, low educational levels and the presence of diseases such as osteoarthritis and sensory changes. The principal symptoms were sleep disturbances in men and sadness and crying in women. Traditional Herbal Medicine was used which reported good results in a 42.9 % of the patients. Conclusions: depression is a frequent entity which is sometimes misdiagnosed. The use of Traditional Herbal Medicine constitutes an alternative treatment for it.

Keywords : population aging; mental health; depression; symptoms; non-pharmacological therapy.

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