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Geriatric Disorders

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Psychiatry for Neurologists

Part of the book series: Current Clinical Neurology ((CCNEU))

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Abstract

At one time, the psychiatry of old age was believed to be “the darkest area of psychiatry.” The often confounding nature of psychiatric disorder in the elderly is illustrated by the large number of terms used over the years to address the diversity among geriatric psychiatric patients, including “late paraphrenia,” “vascular depression,” “pseudodementia,” and “masked depression.” Many of these labels grew out of efforts to distinguish “organic” syndromes from “functional” psychiatric disorders. However, a growing number of studies employing neuroimaging and other state-of-the-art techniques have revealed new insights into the role of brain changes in the etiology of depression and schizophrenia in late life, shedding light on these disorders and yielding hope for new treatment paradigms.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry, University of California, San Diego, CA

    Colin A. Depp PhD

  2. Department of Neurology, University of California, San Diego, CA

    Jody Corey-Bloom MD, PhD

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  1. Colin A. Depp PhD
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  2. Jody Corey-Bloom MD, PhD
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Neurosciences, University of California, San Diego

    Dilip V. Jests MD

  2. Department of Psychiatry and Neurosciences, VA San Diego Healthcare System, San Diego, CA

    Dilip V. Jests MD

  3. Parkinson’s Disease and Movement Disorders Center, NeuroHealth, Warwick, RI

    Joseph H. Friedman MD

  4. University Medical School, Providence, RI

    Joseph H. Friedman MD

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© 2006 Humana Press Inc., Totowa, NJ

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Depp, C.A., Corey-Bloom, J. (2006). Geriatric Disorders. In: Jests, D.V., Friedman, J.H. (eds) Psychiatry for Neurologists. Current Clinical Neurology. Humana Press. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59259-960-8_21

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-59259-960-8_21

  • Publisher Name: Humana Press

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-58829-483-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-59259-960-8

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