A decade of psychiatric consultation with elderly patients in a Dutch general hospital.
A retrospective case study of ten years of psychiatric consultation with elderly in a Dutch general hospital is presented. The number of psychiatric consultations is increasing more than would be expected from admission rates or demographic changes. Of these, 25.4% were diagnosed as suffering from mood disorder and 34.1% from organic mental disorder. Somatic and psychiatric diagnoses alone seem inadequate to describe the severe problems of this specific group of patients.
Roulaux
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Psychiatric Hospital Reinier van Arkel, 's-Hertogenbosch and Vught, The Netherlands.
Oei
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Jansen op de Haar
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D000368:Aged; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D005852:Geriatric Psychiatry / Q000639:trends*; D006801:Humans; D010343:Patient Admission / Q000639:trends; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000639:trends*; D012017:Referral and Consultation / Q000639:trends; D012803:Sick Role; D013406:Suicide, Attempted / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000639:trends