Depression in Older Adults: What Does It Look Like?
There are 31 million Americans 65 years or older, and five million of them (just over 16 percent) have depression (Boswell & Stoudemire, 1996). In Australia, one million people currently suffer from depression, and 14 percent will have it at some point in their lives (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2008). There is some debate as to whether the prevalence of depression increases or decreases with age, with a recent report suggesting that there are fewer diagnoses of depression in older people as the rates are considerably lower than for younger people. However, when broader measures are used which do not exclude from diagnosing contextual conditions more prevalent in older people – such as bereavement or dementia – the prevalence among community-dwelling elders is reported to be betwee... »
