Depressive symptoms detection among the urban elderly in Ya'an city and its influencing factors six years after Lushan earthquake

Abstract

ObjectiveTo investigate the prevalence and characteristics of depressive symptoms among urban elderly six years after Lushan earthquake in Ya'an， so as to provide references for the mental health interventions for elderly following catastrophic stressful life events.MethodsFrom March to April 2019， a multi-stage stratified cluster random sampling method was adopted to enroll 885 urban elderly people aged 60 and above in Ya'an. A self-compiled questionnaire was used to collect the general demographic information， health-related and disaster-related information， meantime， the elderly was assessed using Geriatric Depression Scale （GDS-30）. Thereafter， univariate and multivariate Logistic regression were applied to explore the influencing factors of depressive symptoms in urban elderly.ResultsA total of 783 valid questionnaires were collected， with a questionnaires response rate of 88.47%. Depressive symptoms were detected in 161 cases （20.56%）. The prevalence of depression showed statistical differences among the elderly of different gender， age， marital status， family relationship， monthly per capita household income， physical exercise status， health status， self-care ability， sleep status and disaster-affected degree （P<0.05 or 0.01）. Logistic regression analysis showed that the urban elderly of the female gender （OR=1.552， P=0.040）， monthly per capita household income of 2000~3000 yuan （OR=6.982， P<0.01）， monthly per capita household income≤2000 yuan （OR=6.857， P<0.01）， lack of physical exercise （OR=1.693， P<0.01）， being less capable of self-care （OR=3.838， P<0.01）， being incapable of self-care （OR=8.547， P<0.01）， complicating multiple curable diseases （OR=4.892， P<0.01） and complicating refractory chronic diseases （OR=5.657， P=0.031） were at high risk of depressive symptoms. The risk of depressive symptoms among the divorced or widowed elderly was greater than that among married elderly （OR=0.063， P<0.01）.ConclusionThe prevalence of depressive symptoms is relatively high among the urban elderly six years after Lushan earthquake in Ya'an， moreover， female gender， low monthly per capita household income， lack of physical exercise， being incapable of self-care and poor health status are risk factors affecting the depressive symptom， while being married is a protective factor.

Keywords

• earthquake
• urban elderly
• depressive symptoms