Appraising the Evidence for Treating Depression in Middle-aged Women with Exercise or Pharmacotherap

Background Information and Research Question

In Assignment 1 you were asked to develop an answerable a question related to health. The purpose of assignment 2 is to find the best available evidence to answer your question and to critically appraise that evidence, including the validity, impact and applicability. You should be able to appraise about 5 good quality articles that speak directly to your question. Using critical appraisal tools will be important. You then need to summarize the evidence found and appraised.

That is, for Assignment 2, appraise the 4 highest quality papers (most current, relevant & highest level of evidence), and then summarize the evidence overall. Be sure to include in your assignment how you have appraised the research (what tools you used) and reference accordingly. Your paper should minimally contain: An introduction section - provide relevant background information to problem/topic, define terms, and provide your question and rationale. (One or two paragraphs should be sufficient for this section). Body of paper - should be focused on the appraisal of your (5ish) articles.

Even though you are using appraisal tools to help you, please offer your own insights and critiques as well. A conclusion section - where you come to some type of conclusion to your question, based on the 5ish articles you appraised. That is, you need to clearly state and support, "Yes, the evidence supports the given question", or "No, it does not." For example, using the example provided in the course around medical screening reducing mortality, you might conclude, "the evidence presented and appraised does not support that medical screening reduces mortality in the general population"

In current time of COVID-19 pandemic, depression has been a very serious concern for the women, especially the middle-aged women. However, the main reason for the same varies in different households, some of them were facing the problems of domestic violence whereas other were facing issues of financial issues, all of which eventually leaded to a problem of depression among the middle-aged women. Therefore, to look for the solutions regarding the same, it becomes very necessary for the researchers to look into the matter and conduct the required research accordingly. Moreover, in this particular research also, it will be entailed about the comparison between the exercise as well as medication in order to treat the problem of depression, especially in middle-aged women (Santos, Pimenta, & Nobre, 2007).

To begin with the search strategy, it is required to mention that, firstly it was looked for certain relevant topics which eventually could be used for further study and also has some significance. The topics which were concerned while finalizing this particular research question were all looked over online platforms. Furthermore, after selecting depression as the major concern especially in relation with the current time, the following research question was prepared. This was prepared as per the PICO model, and about the model it was studied over online platforms only.

PICO Question

PICOT Question— In middle aged women (P), does use of exercise (I), as compared to Pharmacotherapy (C), treat depression (O), over a period of 6 months (T)?

P- Elderly people aged 65 years and above,

I- increase in fluid and fiber intake,

C- Use of pharmacotherapy,

O- Reduce the risk of constipation,

T- six months,