Abstract

LAMPERT, Claudia Daiane Trentin  and  SCORTEGAGNA, Silvana Alba. Evaluation of health conditions and cognitive distortions of elderly people with depression. Aval. psicol. [online]. 2017, vol.16, n.1, pp. 48-58. ISSN 1677-0471.  http://dx.doi.org/10.15689/ap.2017.1601.06.

This study evaluated the health conditions and cognitive distortions of elderly people with depression. 75 elderly people participated with an average age of 69.5 years. They were divided into a Clinical Group (CG), with a diagnosis and current depressive symptoms, and another Non-Clinical Group (NCG), without depression. A questionnaire on sociodemographic characteristics, the Mini Mental State Examination, the Geriatric Depression Scale, the Katz Index, the Visual Analogue Scale and the Depressive Thoughts Scale were used. The CG when compared to NCG presented differences with respect to female gender, socioeconomic class C1, the number of comorbidities associated, drugs used regularly, hopelessness and low self-esteem, in addition to perception of dysfunctionality in relationships. The evaluation of the factors related to depression may qualify actions of treatment and prevention in mental health in old age.

Keywords : psychological assessment; psychopathology; cognitions; old age.

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