Ephrem Habte and Tefera Tekle
Objectives: Old age is accompanied by different forms of physical and psychological problems. This study aimed to investigate cognitive functioning among elders with symptoms of depression. Methods: This study employed a cross-sectional descriptive survey. In this study, 116 participants were purposefully selected out of 148 elders from two institutionalized care centers in Addis Ababa with inclusive criteria. The instruments of data collection were GDS-15 and MMSE. Mean, Standard deviation, t-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient were used as methods of data analysis. Results: This study showed that the elders had high rate of depression (68.1%). In addition, 87.1% of elders had declined cognitive functioning. Similarly, the study indicated that there was statistically significant inverse relationship between depression and cognitive functioning (r=-0.48, p<0.01). Elders without partners had manifested higher symptoms of depression. Conclusion: The finding revealed that depression and cognitive decline were higher among the elders. Females had lower cognitive functioning compared to their male counterparts. An increased age and lower level of literacy were associated with lower cognitive functioning and higher symptoms of depression and the married elders had higher score in MMSE compared to others. We suggest that further research is needed to be conducted on non-institutionalized elders.
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