Low-income middle-aged African-American women with high blood pressure very commonly suffer from depression and should be better screened for this serious mental health condition, according to a study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
The researchers found that in a sample of over 300 low-income, African-American women, aged 40-75, with uncontrolled hypertension, nearly 60% screened positively for a diagnosis of depression based on a standard clinical questionnaire about depressive symptoms.
Recent research suggests that hypertension and depression often occur concurrently. Darrell Gaskin and colleagues note that the connection has not been well studied in African Americans, but should be, given they have relatively high rates of hypertension. Moreover, women in general have much higher rates of depression compared to men and depression is often underdiagnosed and untreated.
The nearly 60% prevalence of apparent depression among these hypertensive, low-income middle-aged African American women suggests that these women should be routinely screened for, and, if need be, treated for depression, Gaskin and colleagues emphasize.
They note, however, that 85% of the women with depression-level CES-D-10 scores reported receiving some treatment for depression within the prior six months—implying that much of the depression among these low-income middle-aged, hypertensive African-American women is already treated, albeit inadequately.
Read more at HUB.JHU.edu.
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