Citation

Pietrzak RH, Goldstein RB, Southwick SM, Grant BF. Am. J. Geriatr. Psychiatry 2012; 20(5): 380-390.

Affiliation

National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, VA Connecticut Healthcare System, West Haven, CT (RHP, SMS); Department of Psychiatry, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT (RHP, SMS); and Laboratory of Epidemiology and Biometry, Division of Intramural Clinical and Biological Research, National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD (RBG, BFG).

Copyright

(Copyright © 2012, American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, Publisher Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1097/JGP.0b013e31820d92e7

PMID

22522959

PMCID

PMC3334850

Abstract

OBJECTIVES: : To present findings on the prevalence, correlates, and psychiatric comorbidity of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and partial PTSD in a nationally representative sample of U.S. older adults. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: : Face-to-face interviews with 9,463 adults age 60 years and older in the Wave 2 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions. MEASUREMENTS: : Sociodemographic correlates; worst stressful experiences; comorbid lifetime mood, anxiety, substance use, and personality disorders; psychosocial functioning; and suicide attempts. RESULTS: : Lifetime prevalences ± standard errors of PTSD and partial PTSD were 4.5% ± 0.25 and 5.5% ± 0.27, respectively. Rates were higher in women (5.7% ± 0.37 and 6.5% ± 0.39) than in men (3.1% ± 0.31 and 4.3% ± 0.37). Older adults with PTSD most frequently identified unexpected death of someone close, serious illness or injury to someone close, and their own serious or life-threatening illness as their worst stressful events. Older adults exposed to trauma but without full or partial PTSD and respondents with partial PTSD most often identified unexpected death of someone close, serious illness or injury to someone close, and indirect experience of 9/11 as their worst events. PTSD was associated with elevated odds of lifetime mood, anxiety, drug use, and borderline and narcissistic personality disorders and decreased psychosocial functioning. Partial PTSD was associated with elevated odds of mood, anxiety, and narcissistic and schizotypal personality disorders and poorer psychosocial functioning relative to older adults exposed to trauma but without full or partial PTSD. CONCLUSIONS: : PTSD among older adults in the United States is slightly more prevalent than previously reported and is associated with considerable psychiatric comorbidity and psychosocial dysfunction. Partial PTSD is associated with significant psychiatric comorbidity, particularly with mood and other anxiety disorders.

Language: en