Page 39 - Petelin, Ana, ur. 2024. Zdravje delovno aktivnih in starejših odraslih / Health of Working-Age and Older Adults. Zbornik povzetkov z recenzijo ▪︎ Book of Abstracts. Koper: Založba Univerze na Primorskem/University of Primorska Press

Incidence of depression in institutionalized older people

3
1
Sanja Zoranić , Mara Županić , Ivana Živoder , Vedrana Iveta 1
2
1 University of Dubrovnik, Dubrovnik, Croatia
2 University of Applied Health Sciences, Zagreb, Croatia
3 University North, Varaždin, Croatia
Introduction: Depression is a disorder of the central nervous system caused by chemi-
cal changes in the nerve cells of the brain. Impaired mental health in old age significant-
ly affects quality of life, and depression is cited as the most common mental disorder
causing an increase in morbidity and mortality. Mental health is affected by a number
of factors such as female gender, physical illness, inability to function, loss of significant
others and change of residence, which together with the lack of social support leads
to loneliness and social isolation, predisposing to a depressive state. The aim of the
work was to investigate the occurrence of depression in institutionalised elderly peo-
ple in the Dubrovnik area.
Methods: The study, based on a quantitative methodology, was conducted with a sam-
ple of 86 elderly people of both sexes from the area of the city of Dubrovnik. The in-
struments used for the study were a structured questionnaire on demographic data
and the Geriatric Depression Scale in abbreviated form. The criteria for inclusion of
respondents in the study were age over 60 years and permanent institutionalisation.
People with severe mental illness were not included in the study. The data is present-
ed in absolute numbers and percentages as well as graphically in the form of diagrams
and correlation analyses.
Results: The research results showed that 86.04% of respondents showed no signs of
depression. Mild signs were present in 13.96% of the respondents and not a single re-
spondent showed severe signs of depression. A total of 88.37% of respondents were
satisfied with their lives and 80.23% stated that they were in a good mood most of the
time. A total of 70.93% of respondents spend most of their time outside the home and
have no difficulty accepting new things. The research results show that there is a statis-
tically significant difference in terms of gender. Older women (10.47%) are more like-
ly to show signs of mild depression than men (3.49%). 81.39% of participants stated
that they feel happy most of the time, although there are smaller differences in terms
of age group. Younger older people estimate that they are happy more often, which duševno zdravje delovno aktivnih in starejših odraslih | mental health of working-age and older adults
decreases with age. The same trend can be seen in the assessment of quality of life,
where around three quarters of 65- to 69-year-olds rate this as very high. This pro-
portion drops to a third in older age.
Discussion and conclusion: The research results show that the largest percentage of re-
spondents are satisfied with their lives and in a good mood, while only a smaller per-
centage of respondents, mostly female, show milder signs of depression. Early detec-
tion and treatment of depression in older people improves their quality of life, while
social integration and a social support network reduce the feeling of loneliness and iso-
lation and thus the incidence of mental illness.
Keywords: older people, depression, quality of life

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