As May 3-9 is Mental Health Awareness Week in Canada we wanted to highlight an important issue facing seniors in our communities – loneliness.
As the years go by, seniors’ social circles begin to shrink which often results in loneliness and oftentimes, social isolation. Multiple studies have proven that loneliness is a risk factor for and may contribute to depression, deterioration in cognitive performance and the onset of dementia.
Loneliness is often associated with negative feelings such as sadness, pain, or low self-worth and is a huge risk for seniors as these can lead to other conditions and can be life threatening if they experience a combination of strains on their mental state.
It has been well-documented that lonely seniors are far more likely to deteriorate both physically and mentally than their more social counterparts, and that loneliness and social isolation are associated with a higher mortality risk in adults aged 52 and up.
There are a variety of reasons why lonely seniors are less likely to seek out medical help if their conditions worsen, but one study done by The Mood Disorders Society of Canada suggests that 90% of those afflicted with chronic loneliness don’t seek treatment, which indicates that thousands of seniors living in Canada are suffering in silence — and solitude.