Sections
Anxiety Disorders: Introduction | Shared Versus Distinct Clinical Features of the Anxiety
Disorders | Epidemiology | Age at Onset and Risk Factors for Anxiety Disorders | Worry/Distress Disorders: Generalized Anxiety
Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder | Fear Disorders: Panic Disorder, Agoraphobia, Social
Phobia, and Specific Phobia | Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder | Neuropsychology and Neurobiology of Late-Life Anxiety
Disorders | Comorbidity With Late-Life Depression | Treatment | Clinical Management | Key Points | References | Suggested Readings
Excerpt
This chapter reviews the presentation, epidemiology, correlates,
and treatment of late-life anxiety disorders. Because of the similarities
in pathogenesis and clinical presentation of anxiety disorders and
depression, particularly between generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) and
major depressive disorder (MDD), this chapter addresses comparisons
between late-life anxiety disorders and late-life depression, particularly
in terms of presentation, risk factors, and comorbidity. Much more
is known about the pathophysiology and treatment of geriatric depression
than of geriatric anxiety disorders. Absent are longitudinal or
mechanistic studies that would shed light on aging-related pathophysiology
for the anxiety disorders or elucidate treatment outcomes. With
respect to treatment, few large-scale National Institutes of Health
(NIH)–funded clinical trials have been published, although
some are in progress. Thus, there remain many unanswered basic questions
about anxiety disorders in late life. Despite this, advances in
knowledge about the epidemiology and treatment of these disorders
in late life provide us with a growing body of information to guide
clinicians and researchers (Lenze and Wetherell 2008).