[Endogenous subdepressions among late middle-aged patients at a general-somatic polyclinic]

Endogenic subdepressions were studied in psychogeriatric rooms at three territorial polyclinics. They constituted a considerable portion of all mental abnormalities of the borderline level among all the patients treated in these rooms. The psychopathologic structure of these states was similar to the picture of masked depressions of the elderly age. Such peculiarities explain the erroneous diagnosis of these conditions as vascular (atherosclerotic) psychoorganic syndromes. The authors consider the data about a pathoplastic influence of the "age factor" reflected in both form and essence of the psychopathologic picture.