Chronic Illness in Older Adults

With increasing age there is also a relationship with increasing experiences of illnesses. I have a number of clients who have a comorbidity with depression/anxiety and health related issues. The rumination and sticking point is focussed on the illness as being responsible for their mental health issues and that they are hopeless and helpless to bring about change. I have had success with monitoring symptoms and identifying precipitators and then introducing strategies to reduce e.g., worked with a woman with a dystonic head tremor and through monitoring found it increased with emotional arousal and increased core body temperature, by introducing strategies such as relaxation, cognitive restructuring control over raising body temperatures she was able to regain a sense of hopefulness and this client was discharged, the gains made for her health issues also generalised to other worries she had, however there are also a high number of clients with chronic illness who are more difficult to assist with gaining insight and mastery. Any clues, hints etc, I found the readings noted earlier by Jim but also wondered what else people found helpful.

Regards in anticipation.

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