Depression In Elderly: How to Help Your Aging Parent Manage Their Depression
Throughout these past two weeks, we’ve discussed a wide variety of topics surrounding elderly depression.
Depression can cause serious harm to your loved one if untreated, which is why it’s so important to help your aging parent manage their depression as soon as possible.
To round off our series, we’re going to talk about several options you and your loved one can consider to help manage their depression. Take a look below:
Seeking Medical Assistance
Seeking out a medical opinion from a professional is an extremely important step to helping your loved one manage their depression. Not only does it help you gauge the severity of their depression, it also helps you seek out treatment in a more organized manner, rather than guessing and prolonging their experience.
Another important thing to consider is that seeking out medical advice may also narrow the possibility of other illnesses, such as dementia, which has similar symptoms to depression. Doing so can help increase the chance of proper treatment, sooner rather than later, which may improve your parents life drastically.
Medical Treatment
Once you’ve sought out a medical opinion, your doctor may offer you a few different options for medical treatment. In some instances, a doctor may prescribe a combination of medical treatments depending on what they find necessary.
Here are some of the medical treatments you can expect:
Medicine
- Antidepressant treatment: According to WebMD, most available antidepressants are believed to be equally effective in elderly adults. However, it should be noted that elderly people are more sensitive to medicines and in some cases may already take medicines that could conflict with an antidepressant. As such, it’s important to make sure that you and your doctor find the right balance.
Psychotherapy or counseling
Your doctor may also prescribe some form of psychotherapy or counseling, which can help to address underlying causes rather than just the symptoms. These may include the following:
- Supportive counseling
- Therapy
- Support groups
Managing Depression at Home
Another important aspect of managing depression is taking initiative outside of seeking medical treatment. Here are just a few ways your aging parent can help to manage their depression:
- Exercise
- Connect/reconnect with others
- Maintain a healthy diet
- Maintain a balanced sleep schedule
- Finding new hobbies or returning to old ones
- Volunteering
- Caring for a pet
Managing depression can be a rather difficult task”especially as you age. However, by taking the proper steps to understand depression, as well as the initiative to seek out proper treatment, your loved one can manage their depression and improve their quality of life drastically.
At Encompass, we strive to ensure the best quality of life through all stages of the aging process, and that means going through the good and the bad with you. If you are concerned about your loved ones well being or have any questions, please feel free to give Encompass a call. We are here to help.
Physicians’ Choice Private Duty Assisted Living “ currently serving Omaha, Eastern Nebraska and Western Iowa“provides seniors and their families a complete understanding of geriatric care options and helps families maneuver through the challenges of the system. Get your free Cost Comparison guide by clicking here. Or contact us for a free consultation or just to say hello!
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“Physicians’ Choice Private Duty Assisted Living solves the challenges families face in caring for aging parents, with a focus on strategies that keep them in their homes. To learn more about our solutions, visit http://www.private-duty.firstcareco.wpengine.com.”