Mood changes in Egyptian senile depressives

ABSTRACT

A sample of 31 senile depressed patients aged 65 years or more was selected. All were subjected to careful physical and psychological examinations including provocation of various forms of emotion, and an inquiry about their predominant emotions 6 months prior to asking psychiatric help. A control group comprised 12 persons of nearly the same socio-biological characters was selected. The clinical picture of our senile depressives differs from the known picture of "Depression" in the absence of a depressed mood and the over-representation of hypochondriacal symptoms. Other manifestations are tendency to cry, restlessness, fear, desire for loneliness and marked sensitivity. The emotional state prior to consultation was coloured by a lot of symptoms. These were sense of hopelessness, self reproach, pessimism, frequent dejected mood and a sense of worthlessness. Emotional deprivation is postulated as an essential causative factor, while in 19.4% no evident cause was observed. Difficulties arose in a trial to search for the hereditary load in senile depressives, but it seems that this factor is not so important in predisposition, and that the environmental stresses appeared to be the major contributory elements in depression of late life