Older women are more depressed than older men
New study shows that older women more often become depressed than older men, but have a lower risk to die while depressed.
Lisa C. Barry of the Yale University School of Medicine and her colleagues proved the fact that depression is greatly prevalent in older women than in men. The exact reason is still unknown, but the scientists continue working over this problem. They announce that one to two percent of older people have major depression and two out of every ten have symptoms of depression. They cannot explain why older women are more likely than older men to have these symptoms.
The research involved 750 people of the age 70. The participants provided demographic information, took cognitive tests, and reported any medical conditions at the beginning of the study and every 18 months over a period of 72 months. There was a preliminary screening for symptoms of depression during the previous week such as lack of appetite, feeling sad or insomnia.
About 35.7% of the participants were depressed at some point, 17.8% remained depressed during 2 consecutive periods of the research, 11.2% during 3 periods, 6.3% during 4 and 4.5% during the whole study (5 periods). As a result, more women were depressed than men at their each 18-month evaluation and women had a higher risk than men to have depression at later periods.
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