The psychological well-being in terms of depression, anxiety and locus of control among the elderly with dementia in Malaysia

Abstract

Dementia is the progressive decline in cognitive function due to damage or disease in the body beyond what might be expected from normal aging. It is a non-specific illness syndrome in which affected areas of cognition may be memory, attention, language, and problem solving. Higher mental functions are affected first in the process. Especially in the later stages of the condition, affected persons may be disoriented in time (not knowing what day of the week, day of the month, month, or even what year it is), in place (not knowing where they are), and in person (not knowing who they are or others around them). This study examined the psychological well-being of the elderly suffering from dementia. Three variables were measured, namely depression, anxiety and locus of control. The instruments used were the Geriatric Depression Scale to measure depression, the Beck Anxiety Inventory for anxiety and the Rotter's Locus of Control to measure locus of control. Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR) was used for screening. There were twelve elderly subjects from various nursing homes participated in the study. Among the three components of CDR, most of the elderly had problems with judgement and problem solving (53.9%). 7.7% of the elderly had detrimental memory and 23.1% of the elderly had problems with the sense of orientation. Descriptive results also showed that 76.9% of the elderly had depression. 53.8% of them are considered to reflect a minimal level of anxiety, while 38.5% indicated mild anxiety. Further, 23.1% of the elderly had very strong external locus of control, 46.2% had external locus of control and 30.8% had both external and internal locus of control. None of them had only internal locus of control. In reference to the survey data, there is a strong evidence that elderly suffering from dementia experience tremendous the elderly with dementia which in turn can contribute to the effort of increasing the control. These findings are hoped to give some insight to the psychological well-being of quality of care-giving.