Prevalence of Depression in Geriatric Population and its Relation with Social Support System

Abstract

Aging in general is a natural phenomenon of life in the context of mental health issues; however, Geriatric Depression is prevailing as a serious psychological health problem in this population in particular. This study aims to examine prevalence of depression in Geriatric population and its relation with social support system in the context of the socio-demographics for elderly population. This study has co-relational design, the data was gathered from 200 individuals (≥ 60 years), living in the metropolitan community of Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Peshawar. Purposive convenient sampling technique was utilized, by administration of Urdu versions of Geriatric Depression Scale, Center of Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale, and Social Support List Interaction 12-Items short form, as interview protocols. Psychometric properties of all the three translated and validated Urdu versions of CESD, GDS and SSL12-I were obtained. Reliability of GDS = .88, CESD-S = .88 and SSL12-I = .92 respectively. Prevalence of depression recorded by CES-D scale was 38.5% and by GDS it was 35.5%. Strong positive and highly significant correlation was obtained between GDS and CESD-S scores (r= 0.86, p= < .001). The association between depression measures and social support was negative in direction. For CESD-S and SSL12-I, r = -0.72 and for GDS and SSL12-I, r = -0.70 (p= < .001). Female gender, low level of income, low level of education, unemployment, service during old age and bad health status are found to be strong predictors of depression while, the other demographic factors including age, marital status, and, family structure appeared to have non-significant association with depression.