The Practice Issue in Need of Change
Elderly individuals comprise one of the most vulnerable populations due to the frailty resulting from their old age (Chatterji, Byles, Cutler, Seeman, & Verdes, 2015; Clegg, Young, Iliffe, Rikkert, & Rockwood, 2013). Also, elderly people, often being incapable of caring about themselves and protecting themselves, often may become the victims of neglect and abuse. Thus, it is unsurprising that they often may commit suicide.
For instance, Worthington (n.d.) states that in 2005, 5,404 suicides were committed by individuals aged 65 and older; while older adults of that age accounted for only 12.4% of the total population, they represented nearly 16.6% of all the suicides committed in the U.S. in 2005 (para. 4). Therefore, it is paramount to implement suicide prevention programs and interventions to help geriatric patients reduce their suicidal ideation, consequently lowering their rates of suicide.
Thus, the current project is aimed at providing elderly individuals with interventions for reducing suicidal ideation. It is hoped that utilizing such interventions may help geriatric patients with suicidal ideation to decrease the latter, restoring their desire to live and lowering the rates of suicide among these patients.
PICOT question is as follows: Does implement an intervention aimed at lowering suicidal ideation (I) among geriatric patients (P) for two months (T) allows for decreasing the levels of suicidal ideation among these patients (O) when compared to their levels of suicidal ideation before the intervention (C)?
The significance of this issue is conditioned by the fact that in the case when the suicidal ideation of geriatric patients is not addressed, it may lead to the suicide of these patients, or at least significantly worsen their quality of life.
Description of the Search of the Literature for Evidence
To find the literature with evidence, two databases were searched: Google Scholar (limited to articles from 2013) and PubMed (no time limits). Two articles were retained: Golding, Nadorff, Winer, and Ward (2015), and Morin et al. (2013). These are analyzed in Table 1 below. The search tracker and the PICOT question organizer can be found in Tables 2 and 3 below.
Table 1. Evaluation table. Adapted from Fineout-Overholt, Melnyk, Stillwell, and Williamson (2010).
Table 2. Search Tracker.
Table 3. PICOT question organizer.
Assignment 3
The PICOT question was as follows: Does implement an intervention aimed at lowering suicidal ideation (I) among geriatric patients (P) for two months (T) allows for decreasing the levels of suicidal ideation among these patients (O) when compared to their levels of suicidal ideation before the intervention (C)?
Using the terms from this PICOT question, such as “suicide,” “suicidal ideation,” “elderly,” “geriatric,” and “patients,” allowed for finding several articles on the required topic.
The MESH terms from the branches “psychiatry and psychology” and “health care” were used. Both more general terms (patients) and more specific ones (suicidal ideation, geriatric,) were used. These terms were useful in finding the article by Cha & Lee (2017). Also, see the search tracker table (Table 4) and the evaluation table (Table 5) below.
On the whole, it should be stressed that using these search terms allowed for finding an adequate number of articles on the desired topic. However, it is noteworthy that Google Scholar initially tended to find a great number of outdated sources. Turning on the year of publication filter (since 2013) permitted for discovering more recent sources.
Table 4. Search Tracker.
Table 5. Evaluation table. Adapted from Fineout-Overholt et al. (2010).
References
Cha, K. S., & Lee, H. S. (2017). The effects of ego-resilience, social support, and depression on suicidal ideation among the elderly in South Korea. Journal of Women & Aging, 28, 1-16. Web.
Chatterji, S., Byles, J., Cutler, D., Seeman, T., & Verdes, E. (2015). Health, functioning, and disability in older adults–present status and future implications. The Lancet, 385(9967), 563-575.
Clegg, A., Young, J., Iliffe, S., Rikkert, M. O., & Rockwood, K. (2013). Frailty in elderly people. The Lancet, 381(9868), 752-762.
Fineout-Overholt, E., Melnyk, B. M., Stillwell, S. B., & Williamson, K. M. (2010). Critical appraisal of the evidence: Part III. American Journal of Nursing, 110(11), 43-51. Web.
Golding, S., Nadorff, M. R., Winer, E. S., & Ward, K. C. (2015). Unpacking sleep and suicide in older adults in a combined online sample. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 11(12), 1385-1392. Web.
Morin, J., Wiktorsson, S., Marlow, T., Olesen, P. J., Skoog, I., & Waern, M. (2013). Alcohol use disorder in elderly suicide attempters: A comparison study. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, 21(2), 196-203. Web.
Worthington, B. (n.d.). Elder suicide: A needless tragedy. Web.