Relationship between family functioning and depression in older adults at a primary care clinic

Abstract

Objective: to analyze the relationship between the perception of family functionality and depression in older adults with various pathologies. Methods: cross-sectional analytical study, 250 patients aged 60 years or older attending the Family Medicine Clinic Gustavo A. Madero, Mexico City, of the Instituto de Seguridad y Servicios Sociales de los Trabajadores del Estado (Institute of Security and Social Services of the State Workers) participated. The Yesavage questionnaire for the diagnosis of depression and the ff-sil family functioning test were applied. The Kruskal-Wallis test was used to relate both variables due to the ordinal and polytomous level of the independent variable. The level of statistical significance was <0.05 to reject the null hypothesis. Results: the median age was 72 years, 62.4% were female. In family functionality, 5.2% had a dysfunctional family and none presented severe dysfunctionality. Regarding depression, 9.6% presented moderate and severe symptoms. In the analysis of the relationship between the variables of family functionality and diagnosis of depression, statistical significance was obtained (p<0.0001). Some degree of depression was present in 84.6% of the patients with family dysfunction, while in functional families depression was present in 17.4% of the patients. In the relationship between the same variables, considering the comorbidities type 2 diabetes mellitus, arterial hypertension, prostate alteration, venous insufficiency, dyslipidemia and osteoarthrosis, in all cases there was statistical significance regardless of whether or not they presented the pathology. On the other hand, in patients with a diagnosis of cancer, thyroid dysfunction, sleep disorder and cerebral vascular event, there was no statistical significance between the variables when the patients presented the pathology. Conclusion: A statistically significant relationship was obtained between the levels of family functionality and the presence of depression in the general population, and for most of the comorbidities, regardless of whether the condition was present or not. However, in pathologies such as thyroid dysfunction, cerebral vascular event, cancer and sleep disorders, when the pathology was present, no statistical significance was obtained between the variables.