Irish study identifies 5 forms of elder abuse
The National Centre for the Protection of Older People (NCPOP) in Ireland has launched a new report, The National Study of Elder Abuse and Neglect, based on research led by Dr Corina Naughton, is focused on five forms of elder abuse:
- Physical abuse including being threatened or hit with an object, slapped, kicked, being restrained or denied access to equipment such as a walking or hearing aid.
- Psychological abuse including being insulted, excluded, undermined or prevented from seeing people the older person cares about such as grandchildren.
- Financial abuse including instances in which money or possessions were stolen or the person was forced to sign over property.
- Sexual abuse defined as being talked to or touched in a sexual way.
- Neglect including the refusal or failure of a carer to help with activities of daily living such as shopping, washing or dressing.
- Abuse refers to physical, sexual, financial and psychological abuse while mistreatment also includes neglect.
The 12-month prevalence study defined physical, financial or sexual abuse as one or more incidents while psychological abuse and neglect were categorised as consisting of 10 or more incidents, while the prevalence study of mistreatment since an older person turned 65 covered any incident of abuse.
The study involved 2,021 people over the age of 65 being interviewed face-to-face in their homes between April and May 2010.
The report’s summary is available at http://www.ncpop.ie/userfiles/file/Prevalence%20study%20summary%20report.pdf
