Mental health diagnoses and health care utilization in persons with dementia, Parkinson's disease, and stroke.

Calleo J, Amspoker AB, Marsh L, Kunik ME. Mental health diagnoses and health care utilization in persons with dementia, Parkinson's disease, and stroke. The Journal of Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences. 2014 Dec 26; 27(2):e117-21.

Dimensions for VA is a web-based tool available to VA staff that enables detailed searches of published research and research projects.

If you have VA-Intranet access, click here for more information vaww.hsrd.research.va.gov/dimensions/

VA staff not currently on the VA network can access Dimensions by registering for an account using their VA email address.    Search Dimensions for VA for this citation
* Don't have VA-internal network access or a VA email address? Try searching the free-to-the-public version of Dimensions

Search for Abstract from PubMed

---

Abstract:

In late life, neurological disturbances, depression, and anxiety frequently complicate the clinical presentation but are often undertreated. An administrative database of 3,034 male veterans, age 55 years and older, with a diagnosis of dementia, Parkinson's disease, or stroke was examined for the prevalence of mood and anxiety disorders and mental health service use. Those with more than one of these neurological diagnoses were most likely to have a comorbid depressive or anxiety disorder. The majority of patients with anxiety and depression were prescribed antidepressants. Mental health specialty visits were less frequent than medication treatment overall but most common for those with dementia only. These data suggest that specialty mental health care remains a significant unmet need for individuals with neurological disorders complicated by depression and anxiety.