Elderly people are at a greater risk of mental disorders than younger people are. Many of the illnesses they suffer—depression, Alzheimer's disease, anxiety, and other health problems—can be diagnosed and treated properly. However, many elderly people are reluctant to seek psychiatric treatment because they don't understand mental illness or acknowledge its existence. They feel ashamed of their symptoms or feel that they are an inevitable part of aging. In addition, many times doctors fail to recognize the symptoms of treatable mental illness in older people.

The following statistics illustrate the impact of mental illness among the elderly:

• Fifteen to 25% of elderly people in the U.S. suffer from significant symptoms of mental illness.
• The highest suicide rate in America is among those aged 65 and older.
• Severe organic mental disorders afflict one million elderly people in the U.S., and another two million suffer from moderate organic disorders.

Two very common mental health conditions in the elderly are depression and dementia. Differential diagnosis between these conditions is often difficult because depression can often mimic dementia, and some experts estimate that as many as 10% of those diagnosed with dementia actually suffer from depression. Depression is characterized by the following symptoms:

• Feelings of worthlessness, hopelessness, and helplessness
• Inappropriate guilt and prolonged sadness or unexplained crying spells
• Jumpiness or irritability
• Loss of interest in and withdrawal from, family, friends, work, sex ,or formerly enjoyable activities
• Intellectual problems, such as unexplainable loss of memory, the inability to concentrate, or confusion and disorientation
• Thoughts of death, suicide, or suicide attempts
• Physical problems, such as a loss of or noticeable increase in appetite, persistent fatigue and lethargy, insomnia or alternatively an increase in the amount of sleep needed, aches and pains, constipation, or other physical ailments

Dementia is characterized by general confusion and memory loss, but often the symptoms are similar to depression. About 15% of older Americans suffer from this condition. Of that number, an estimated 60% suffer from Alzheimer's disease, a progressive mental deterioration for which no cause or cure has been found. Dementia can be caused by:

• Complications from chronic high blood pressure, from blood vessel disease, or from a previous stroke
• Parkinson's disease, which generally begins with involuntary and small tremors or problems with voluntary movements
• Huntington's disease, a genetic disorder that begins in middle age and has symptoms of changed personality, mental decline, psychosis, and movement disturbances
• Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, thought to be caused by a viral infection leading to rapid and progressive dementia