Mental illness in late life: socioeconomic conditions, psychiatric symptoms, and adjustment of long-term sufferers

Abstract

The relationships between social and economic conditions and psychiatric disorder among 346 older adults with severe mental illness living in the community are examined in this article. Measures included socioeconomic indexes, symptoms, diagnoses, and adjustment. As expected, socioeconomic and illness factors were interrelated in this sample. Diagnosis was related to both functioning and socioeconomic factors. As a rule, participants were financially impoverished but socially integrated into social networks consisting largely of kin. In spite of impoverishment and presence of significant symptoms, most were maintaining themselves in the community with at least marginal functioning, though they received very little support from the mental health system beyond medication. Compared with the younger cohort, the older cohort was functioning better, had fewer symptoms, and had better global adjustment. Those with coexisting psychotic and affective syndromes were most at risk. Future analyses with this data set will need to develop complex multivariate models to predict the primary influences on functioning and short-term stability.