Elder Abuse
| Author | Jeffrey Wilson |
| Pages | 1255-1258 |
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As the population of elderly people in the United States increases, so does the incidence of what is known as elder abuse. Estimates put the number of cases in which elderly victims are abused as high as half a million annually. The number of reported incidents, however, is barely 15 percent of that.
As with all forms of abuse, elder abuse affects people from all socioeconomic backgrounds. The more frail the individual, the more likely he or she will be a victim of abuse. Abuse can be physical or emotional, subtle or blatant. Most frightening is that abuse is most likely to come at the hands of someone the victim trusts: a child, a spouse, a caregiver.
With elder abuse more pervasive, the issue has garnered increased attention, and a number of groups, along with federal, state, and local agencies, are taking steps to reverse the trend. Part of the challenge is to find ways to get people to report abuse when it happens. This means educating people to know and watch for warning signs, and it means encouraging victims to speak out without fear of recrimination.
The word "abuse" carries a number of interpretations; legal definitions may differ from researchers' definitions, and experts frequently disagree among themselves. Abuse can manifest itself in any of several forms; as a practical matter, we can define abuse here as deliberate maltreatment or mistreatment. The most pervasive forms of mistreatment include the following:
Any use of physical force that results in injury, pain, or any sort of impairment constitutes physical abuse. It includes striking, pushing, and shoving, shaking, kicking, punching, and slapping. Some abusers will strike the victim with an object. Others will inflict burns on the victim. Force-feeding or with-holding food, administering inappropriate drugs, and applying physical restraints all come under the heading of abuse. There will often be visible signs of physical abuse, such as bruises, swellings, burn marks, scratches, or broken bones. Not infrequently, these injuries will be attributed to carelessness (a fall, standing too close to the stove).
There are no overtly physical signs of emotional or psychological abuse, but that does not make it any
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less serious than actual physical abuse. A victim may be subjected to angry verbal tirades, harassment, threats, and humiliation. Affecting an over-protective manner toward the victim, as though to imply that the victim is in capable of caring for him- or herself, can be a more subtle form of emotional abuse. Sometimes the abuser will isolate the victim from family and friends or much-enjoyed activities (even something as simple as a daily outing to the local newspaper stand). A person who is being emotionally abused may become either strangely agitated or overly withdrawn.
Sexual activity that is non-consensual is abuse, and unfortunately the elderly are not immune to this sort of victimization. It could be anything from unwanted touching and groping to forced posing for explicit photographs to rape and sodomy. Unexplained genital bruising, bleeding, or infection can be a sign that sexual abuse is taking place.
In the 1935 play Kind Lady, an elderly woman is befriended by a family that subsequently robs her of her money and possessions. Unfortunately, this crime happens in real life all too frequently. This form of abuse includes cashing the victim's pension checks and keeping the money, forging the victim's signature, misusing a power of attorney, coercing the victim to sign a will or a deed to property, and outright...
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