Single Review on past events

Talk by CAT group: Jessie Dezutter (KU Leuven), Daan Duppen, Gørill Haugan, Helena Larsson, Suvi-Maria Saarelainen

Moderation: Jennifer Randerath

Abstract:

Our world is facing a unique shift to an older population which is a positive but equally challenging trend since increased age is often followed by increased comorbidities and disabilities, leading to the need for long-term care in a nursing home (NH). Entry to a NH itself is often experienced as a major loss, added on top of other losses like cognitive and physical loss, and loss of social relations and autonomy. The combination of these losses and disabilities are proven risk factors in the development of geriatric depression. Simultaneously, NH-professionals report existential needs and existential struggling of their residents and feel unequipped to meet these needs. Whereas understanding existential suffering has increasingly become a focus in cancer care and palliative medicine, this is hardly studied in the NH- context. Furthermore, despite the similarities between symptoms of geriatric depression like emptiness and hopelessness (DSM-5) and existential concerns like meaninglessness and existential loneliness, and despite the overlap in items to measure geriatric depression and existential concerns, no knowledge is available on how geriatric depressive symptoms and existential concerns are related. This project, therefore, clarifies the relationship between geriatric depressive symptoms and existential concerns and implements this knowledge in psycho-educational training for NH-professionals.
Since current (preliminary) knowledge on meaning-in-life, existential loneliness and depressive symptoms is fragmented across different fields, an interdisciplinary approach is highly needed. The project holds therefore a multi-method design and focuses on interdisciplinary integration. It, furthermore, includes the perspectives of both NH-residents and NH-professionals to provide in-depth insight in the phenomena at stake. In this seminar, we will introduce the theoretical frameworks that guide our work, and give an overview of the studies that we aim to conduct.