Gerontology and Gerontic Nursing Practice

NRS 353 Gerontology and Gerontic Nursing Practice

Assignment 2: Assignment Questions

Questions and Answers about Elderly People and Patients
Submitted by: Fujimi Sakai Student No: 11413992

Lecturer’s Name: Christine Haley

Due date: 25 January 2010 Date of submission: 25 January 2010

Introduction Health of older people has some issues which nurses should know. Older people tend to suffer some health problems, however, some people do not know about problems of older people and may treat them wrongly. These are some questions and answers below whose topics may be well-known but misunderstood. Nurses need to know scientific truth about health and health problems of older people and should reject myths of them which may be widely known.

Q 1: Discuss reasons for why the elderly suicide Hughes (2006, p. 549) noted risk factors of suicide for older people: Majority of older people who commit suicide generally has depressive disorder when they are dead. Also, the elderly who have physical illness and complain pain are more likely to suicide. Luggen (2004, p. 636) added spousal loss are clearly relates to elderly suicide. Negative experiences such as loss of spouse or declining physical health are precipitating factors for depression (Hughes, 2006, p. 536). Also, these experiences might be more common for older adults. Thus, depressive disorder is one of common factors which cause the elderly people suicide and depressive events are more likely to occur for the older people because of loss of things they valued.

Q 2: Define the word dementia Davies, Aveyard and Norman (2006, p. 491) define the term of dementia as “a range of brain disorders that have in common loss of brain function that is usually progressive, irreversible and eventually fatal. Collectively, these conditions represent the most common serious mental illnesses affecting older people.” “Dementia can be a symptom of a number of conditions, including Alzheimer’s disease, vascular dementia,

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