A Cross-Cultural Understanding of Depression Among Elderly Korean Immigrants

Abstract

In the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, both the DIS-III and Lee's version of the DIS-III, modified for Koreans living in Korea, were administered to 674 elderly Korean immigrants. Subsequently, a semi-structured interview guide for depression, with open-ended questions designed explicitly for Korean immigrants, was administered to 34 of the people judged to be depressed under the Korean DIS-III and 35 people randomly selected from the group that scored as not depressed under the Korean DIS-III. With the DIS-III, the lifetime prevalence rate for these immigrants was 7.12%; with Lee's modified version, the rate rose to 8.31%. The semi-structured interview guide for depression, however, showed loneliness, sadness, and somatic symptoms among both groups of people, those judged depressed and those judged not depressed. Clinicians working with elderly Korean immigrants consequently are advised to ask questions that specifically focus on loneliness, family harmony, health problems and popular Korean illnesses before ruling out depression.