title: Assessment of Nutritional and Depression Status in Free-Living El-derly in Tabriz, Northwest Iran.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Malnutrition and depression are the common health problems in elderly population. Poor nutrition might have a strong effect on the incidence of depression. The aims of this study were to assess the nutritional and depression status and the possibly relationship between these variables in the urban free-liv-ing elderly in Tabriz, northwestern Iran.
  
  
  METHODS
  This cross-sectional study was carried out on 184 elderly people (male=97; female=87) with age 60 years or elder in 2012. All subjects entered to the study voluntarily from those attending to daily care centers for elderly peo-ple. Mini Nutritional Assessment (MNA) tool and Geriatric Depression Score (GDS) were used to evaluate nutritional status and depression scores, respec-tively. Con-tinuous variables were expressed as mean ± standard deviation (SD) and qualita-tive data were presented as frequency (percent). Spearman's correla-tion was em-ployed to determine the relationship between variables.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Up to 50% of subjects had poor nutrition status. About 14% of elderly people had serve depression and 28.3% had mild depression. There was a posi-tive significant correlation between MNA and GDS tests in both gender (r=0.416; P<0.001).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  There was no acceptable level of nutritional status and mental health in the elderly people. Further studies are needed to evaluate the other factors that can effect on the quality of life in this population.
authors.affiliation: Student`s Research Committee, Department of Nutrition, Tabriz University of Medical Science, Tabriz, Iran.
authors.forename: Laleh
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Payahoo
authors.affiliation: Student`s Research Committee, Department of Nutrition, Tabriz University of Medical Science, Tabriz, Iran.
authors.forename: Yaser
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Khaje-Bishak
authors.affiliation: Nutrition Research Center, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
authors.forename: Bahram
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Pourghassem Gargari
authors.affiliation: Student`s Research Committee, Department of Nutrition, Tabriz University of Medical Science, Tabriz, Iran.
authors.forename: Mohammad-Bagher
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: Kabir-Alavi
authors.affiliation: Road Traffic Injury Research Centre, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran.
authors.forename: Mohammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Asgharijafarabadi
keywords: Depression; Elderly; Geriatric Depression Score; Iran; Mini Nutritional Assessment