Peritogiannis Vaios, Lixouriotis Charalampos
Mobile Mental Health Unit of the Prefectures of Ioannina and Thesprotia, Society for the Promotion of Mental Health in Epirus, Ioannina, Greece.
Health Center of Distomo, General Hospital of Livadia, Distomo, Greece.
J Neurosci Rural Pract. 2019 Oct;10(4):721-724. doi: 10.1055/s-0039-3399603. Epub 2019 Dec 11.
Mental disorders may go unrecognized and undertreated in older adults. This is the rationale for the launch of specialized mental health services for the elderly in high resourced settings. Rural areas, however, do not receive adequate mental health care owing to socioeconomic and geographical reasons, and this is the case of rural Greece, where research on mental health of the elderly is scarce. This article discusses the challenges of providing mental health care for older adults in rural Greece and the available options. Care can be delivered through the existing rural mental health services that are the mobile mental health units and through the primary care physicians. Training in psychogeriatrics for the personnel of the former and in mental health for the latter is warranted.
精神障碍在老年人中可能未被识别和治疗不足。这就是在资源丰富的地区为老年人推出专门心理健康服务的理由。然而，由于社会经济和地理原因，农村地区无法获得足够的心理健康护理，希腊农村地区就是这种情况，那里对老年人心理健康的研究很少。本文讨论了在希腊农村为老年人提供心理健康护理的挑战以及可用的选择。护理可以通过现有的农村心理健康服务机构（即流动心理健康单位）以及初级保健医生来提供。前者的工作人员需要接受老年精神病学培训，后者需要接受心理健康培训。
