Correlates of Mental Health Conditions and Prolonged Grief Disorder among Widows from Selected Churches in Nairobi County, Kenya

Abstract

Background: Prolonged grief disorder (PGD) is a chronic mental health condition that causes functional impairment in which about 45% - 50% of bereaved individuals adapt to the loss quickly, whereas the rest of this population prolong the symptoms of grief for more than a year after the loss of a loved one. PGD often co-exists with other mental disorders such as PTSD, depression, anxiety and many more. Objective: This study sought to investigate the correlates of depression, PTSD, and complicated grief among widows from selected churches in Nairobi County, Kenya. Methods: A total of 253 widows with age ranges from 30 to 80 years with a mean age of 45.3 ± (SD: 10.698) were recruited into the study. The tools for data collection were a researcher-generated social demographic questionnaire, Inventory of Complicated Grief (ICG), Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II), and Harvard Trauma Questionnaire Revised (HTQ-5). Results: The results of Pearson correlation test indicated that there was a strong positive correlation between PGD and depressive disorder at 2-tailed significant level (r = 0.825, p = 0.001), between PGD and PTSD (r = 0.760; p = 0.001), between the participants’ years of marriage and PGD (r = 724; p = 0.001), between depressive disorder and PTSD (r= 0.619; p = 0.001). However, this study showed a negative correlation between the period of widowhood and depressive illness (r = −0.011; p = 0.05). Conclusion: This study concludes that while screening widows for PGD, clinicians may assess other comorbidities of PGD such as depression and PTSD early enough.