![\"\"](\"http:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/images\/blogpics\/DoctorandPatient.jpg\" "\\"empathy\\"")
Between five and 10 per cent of people over 60 suffer from depression – a common and disabling disorder.<\/p>\n
It is predicted that\u00a0 depression will be the second leading cause of disability worldwide\u00a0 within the next 10 years, making it a major public health problem.<\/p>\n
In the biggest study of depression in older people in Australia,\u00a0 researchers at The University of Western Australia and nationally showed\u00a0 that by educating GPs, it was possible to reduce the prevalence of\u00a0 depression, self-harm and suicidal thoughts\u00a0 in their older patients<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Published in the Annals of Family Medicine<\/em>, the study found\u00a0 that a physician’s empathy and willingness to discuss the emotional\u00a0 concerns of patients might play an important role in reducing self-harm\u00a0 thoughts and depression<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The study’s chief investigator, Winthrop Professor Osvaldo Almeida at\u00a0 UWA’s Centre for Health and Ageing, said more than 370 GPs and almost\u00a0 22,000 patients took part in the two-year study.\u00a0 Some of the GPs (the control group) received no structured education while others had their\u00a0 practice reviewed and received relevant educational material and\u00a0 six-monthly newsletters over the two years of the study.<\/p>\n “We wanted to test a more universal approach to depression treatment,\u00a0 one that would not be limited to older people who show overt or slight\u00a0 depressive symptoms,” Professor Almeida said.<\/p>\n “The patients seen by the GPs who had received the educational\u00a0 intervention were less likely to display symptoms of depression or\u00a0 self-harming behaviour after two years than the controls.\u00a0 In other\u00a0 words, the relative number of people with these problems decreased in the intervention group.<\/p>\n “What caused these changes is not entirely clear, but the benefits\u00a0 could not be explained by more frequent use of antidepressants or\u00a0 greater contact with health services.\u00a0 The most plausible explanation is\u00a0 that the GPs who received the intervention were more willing to discuss\u00a0 their patients’ emotional concerns and that this greater openness and\u00a0 empathy made all the difference.”<\/p>\n Professor Almeida said the intervention was simple and inexpensive,\u00a0 although replication of the results is required before the study\u00a0 activities can be recommended for adoption in normal clinical practice.<\/p>\n “Our results are exciting because they indicate that we may be able\u00a0 to decrease the prevalence of depression and self-harm behaviour in the\u00a0 community by means of targeted education of health professionals.\u00a0 They\u00a0 also suggest that, in some instances, the relationship between patients\u00a0 and physicians might be more therapeutic than the drugs they prescribe.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From the University of Western Australia press release via HealthCanal: Between five and 10 per cent of people over 60 suffer from depression – a common and disabling disorder. It… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5,10],"tags":[14,116,49,158,12],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4731"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4740,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4731\/revisions\/4740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4731"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4731"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/therapytoronto.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4731"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}