Use of bubropion in elderly patients

Mood state disorders are, together with anxiety, the most common psychiatric disorder in the elderly. They are generally associated to multiple conditions that are frequent in elderly age, such as pain, somatic disease or cognitive deterioration and to psychosocial factors (loneliness, impoverishment, discapacity or mourning). Depression in the elderly has an important impact on the quality of life and general health in this age and noticeably casts a shadow over the functional prognosis or survival related with the concomitant medical diseases. It also contributes, in a large degree, to the stress of the caregiver. In the daily clinical practice, depression in the elderly is underdetected and undertreated in spite of the effectiveness of the treatments available. In the antidepressive drug treatment in the elderly, it is important to achieve its effectiveness without jeopardizing safety. The experience in the use of bupropion as an antidepressant in elderly patients is presented.