‘OLD PEOPLE WHO ARE HAPPY ARE EATING HEALTHY’
The elderly are finding peace at retirement homes, those who don’t have depression eat healthy. In a study titled, “The Correlation between Depression and Nutrition in Elderly Living at Retirement Homes”, led by Melahat Kızıl, Lecturer of Izmir University of Economics (IUE) Vocational School of Health Sciences, the lecturers observed the elderly living at Izmir Metropolitan Municipality Gürçeşme Zübeyde Hanım Retirement Home. Among the old people staying there and well taken care of, it has been found out that 48.6% had mild depression, whereas 21.6% of them had severe depression. It has been reported that severe depression brought along lack of nutrition.
The study team of Melahat Kızıl, Prof. Dr. Nazan Turhan, Dean of IUE Faculty of Agricultural Technology and Food Sciences, Prof. Dr. İlgi Şemin, Director of IUE Vocational School of Health Sciences, Lecturer Nursun Üstünkarlı, and Asst. Prof. Dr. Nilgün Gürkaynak, Lecturer at IUE Faculty of Business, revealed that the old people who have depression have bad eating habits as well. While 27% of the elderly women had severe depression, only 16% of elderly males had it severely.
‘Severe depression causes malnutrition’
Kızıl pointed out that 74 elderly participated in the study, and 36.5% of those were never visited by their family or friends. Kızıl stated the following:
“We found out that 67.6% of the elderly who volunteered to participate in our study has at least one chronic disease. The most frequent ones are high blood pressure, diabetes, and congestive heart failure. We based our study on the Geriatric Depression Scale. The study revealed that 29.8% of the elderly did not have depression, 48.6% had mild depression, whereas 21.6% of them had severe depression. We also studied the correlation between malnutrition and depression in the elderly. While 68.9% did not have any risk of malnutrition, 23% of them had it mildly, and 8.1% of them had it severely. So, it is safe to say that there is a relation between depression and malnutrition.”
Recommendations…
Kızıl mentioned that they focused on the roots of the depression and its relation between nutrition for the elderly living at retirement homes who has depression. “As a result, we suggest analysing the eating habits of the elderly with severe risk of malnutrition. The personnel working at retirement homes needs to be trained on depression and malnutrition, or necessary measures need to be taken regarding the issue. All these studies will have a tremendous effect on increasing the quality of life of the elderly, said Kızıl.
