Somatoform complaints in elderly of Germany

The aim of this paper is to report on the prevalence of somatoform disorders in older age. A total of 630 representatively selected persons older than 60 years were asked to complete the questionnaire SOMS 2 (Screening for somatoform disorders, Rief et al., 1997). The results show that somatoform pain is very common in old age. Of the people, 71.8% report at least one symptom, 50.5% on at least four symptoms and 23.4% suffer from at least eight symptoms. The frequency of somatoform symptoms is much higher in people over 60 years old than in persons who are younger than 60 years old. Pain is very often localized in several body regions. In contrast to findings from younger age groups, older women do not report more somatoform pain than older men. When looking at the differences between "young olds" and "old olds" somatoform pain increases with increasing age. The high frequency of somatoform pain in older people is in clear contrast to the low prevalences of somatoform disorders defined according to DSM-IV or ICD-10 (0%-0.3%). The results show that the real prevalence of somatoform disorders is extremely underestimated because of the restrictive criteria of the diagnosis systems.