[Reaction to mourning in elderly subjects]

Although in most cases mourning is characterised by phenomena of adaptation with development towards a new balance on a course that can be considered "normal" it is certainly for many people an event capable of involving and altering the psychophysical make-up with more or less serious and variously reversible consequences. The possibility, therefore, of a course definable as "pathological", with an increase in risks of morbosity and morbidity means that every situation must be considered specifically, focusing attention on personal, social and biological variables that can determine a "risk" course. The loss experience is also to be considered with particular attention as regards the problems of the elderly who are more exposed and more vulnerable to these events and to the difficulties directly or indirectly related to them. From this point of view an attempt has therefore been made to identify certain interpretative hypotheses on the interconnections between deprivation reaction and psycho-physical consequences for the individual, especially in relation to the elderly subject who frequently already lives a situation of psychophysical precariousness.