Psychiatric Morbidities of Elderly Out-patients Attending Various Outreach Clinics in Gandaki Province of Nepal: A Descriptive Cross-sectional Study

INTRODUCTION: Dramatic growth of the aging population resulted in an increased number of mental disorders and such data are limited in Nepal. The objective is to find out the psychiatric morbidities of elderly out-patients attending Baglung, Kusma, Walling, and Dumre out-reach clinics in Gandaki Province of Nepal. METHODS: This was a descriptive cross-sectional study conducted in 392 patients attending out-reach clinics of Baglung, Kusma, Walling, and Dumre of Gandaki Province for one year with the convenient sampling method. Ethical approval was taken from the Institutional Review Committee of Manipal College of Medical Sciences, Pokhara. The diagnosis was done according to the International Classification of Disease-10 guidelines. Epi-info 7 was used and point estimate at 95% Confidence Interval was calculated along with frequency and proportion for binary data and the analysis was done. RESULTS: The prevalence of neurotic, stress-related, and somatoform disorders 145 (37.0%) was maximum followed by mood disorders 111 (28.3%). Maximum cases were in between 66 and 75 years, Brahmin and Chhetri caste, females, married, and from an extended nuclear family. There is more prevalence of female gender in all psychiatric diagnoses except in mental and behavioral disorders due to psychoactive substance use. There is more prevalence of age groups of patients less than or equal to 75 years in all the psychiatric diagnosis. CONCLUSIONS: Neurotic, stress-related, and somatoform disorders were the most common diagnosis. The risk of development of certain disorders based on gender and age group of the patients would be helpful for case identification.