The purpose of this cross-sectional observational study was to explore depressive symptoms, among 377 women, during hospitalization for acute coronary syndrome (ACS). Women were screened for depressive symptoms using the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II). Pearson chi-squared tests for independence were used for comparisons between categorical variables and t-tests for independent samples were used for comparisons between continuous variables. Tukey's honestly significant difference test along with one-way anova test was used to conduct multiple comparisons between the three defined age groups ranging from 29-49, 50-64 to ≥65 years. A total of 118 women screened positive for depression (BDI-II score ≥ 14). The percentage of women that met the criteria for a positive depression screening was significantly different between the three age groups. The proportion of depressed women who reported feelings of sadness, past failures, punishment, self-dislike, agitation, worthlessness, sleep disturbances and irritability varied significantly by age group. Study findings indicate that symptom experience and severity may differ across a lifetime. These results support the need to understand the complexity of depressive symptoms experienced by women. The ability to understand and recognize depressive symptoms in women, with ACS, may assist healthcare professionals with the management of a modifiable cardiovascular risk factor.
Keywords: common mental health; coronary heart disease; depression; mental health; women's mental health.
© 2013 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.