A Community Study of Mental Disorders in Elderly Singaporean Chinese Using the Gms-Agecat Package

Abstract

A random sample of 612 elderly Chinese aged 65 and over living in the community in Singapore was assessed with the community version of the Geriatric Mental State (GMS) and the data analysed by the AGECAT program to provide computerised diagnoses. The prevalence of organic disorder (dementia) was 2.3%, depression 5.7%, neuroses 1.5% and paranoid disorder 0.5%. The results were generally lower compared to the study of elderly people in Liverpool using the GMS-AGECAT package. Concordance between AGECAT and the psychiatrist's diagnoses for organic disorder, depression, neuroses and paranoid disorder achieved kappa values of 0.87, 0.88, 0.58 and 1.0 respectively.

Psychiatric disorders in elderly from the Indian sub-continent living in Bradford

“…High rates were also found in Cape Town, with South Africa coloured elders using the Present State Examination schedule (Ben-Arie et al, 1983). This is in contrast to low rates found in Chinese elderly in Singapore (Kua, 1992). The high rates observed could be a re¯ection of some constitutional vulnerability.…”

“…A literature search failed to ®nd any published study in this cultural group. While considerable research has been published from Europe (Kay et al, 1964;Copeland et al, 1987), the USA (Copeland et al, 1987;Heyman et al, 1991), South-East Asia (Kua, 1992) and Africa (Ben-Arie et al, 1983;Hendrie et al, 1995), the rates of psychiatric disorders have varied considerably. Dementia rates of 2±8.6% and depression rates of 4.6±19.4% have been reported (Ben-Arie et al, 1983;Copeland et al, 1987).…”

A meta-analysis of epidemiological studies in depression of older people in the People's Republic of China

“…Only 3.65% lived alone even though they had children, and 2.17% were alone (ie single) (X. S. Chen et al, 1987). In contrast, overseas Chinese might be thought to follow a western lifestyle and therefore have a higher risk of depression, eg from 5.7% in Singapore (Kua, 1992) to 13.0% in Liverpool, UK (although, due to a small sample, it was not signi®cantly dierent from the level of the Caucasian Liverpool residents (10.00%) (McCracken et al, 1997). Living environments in China for some of these subjects have changed and other risk factors have been added, such as pressure of work.…”

“…In this meta-analysis, we selected those studies published in The People's Republic of China before May 1997, but did not include Hong Kong (Woo et al, 1994) or other Chinese populations, eg Singapore (Kua, 1992). Most studies were carried out in the late 1980s and in early 1990.…”

Validating screening instruments for cognitive impairment in older South Asians in the United Kingdom

“…GMS±AGECAT has been validated across many cultures (Kua, 1992;Saz et al, 1996). It has performed well when compared against psychiatrists' diagnoses in India (Rajkumar and Kumar, 1996).…”