Treatment Options for the Depressed Elderly
Because depression in older adults is so widely unrecognised, it can be difficult to comprehend just how forcefully conditions such as deteriorating health, a sense of isolation and hopelessness, and the challenge of adjusting to new life circumstances can create a “perfect storm” pushing an already-depressed person over the edge to suicide. When depression is not treated in elderly white men (in the United States), the suicide rate is six times the national average. Unbelievably, 75 percent of those men will have been seen by a doctor within several months of their deaths: clearly a doctor who did not truly “see” them! Proper treatment can prevent suicide, but because it so often goes unrecognised, the (U.S.) National Institute of Mental Health considers depression in people age 65 and ol... »
