Elder abuse is any intentional or negligent behavior that results in physical, sexual, emotional, pharmacological, and/or financial abuse.

Assignment 1: Practicum – Week 10 Journal Entry

Elder abuse is any intentional or negligent behavior that results in physical, sexual, emotional, pharmacological, and/or financial abuse. Unfortunately, abuse is sometimes difficult to identify, and elders are often hesitant or unable to report abuse themselves (Administration on Aging, n.d.). This makes it important for health care providers to regularly monitor for signs of abuse and react according to local and state laws.

Journal Entry Part 1

For the first part of your journal entry, select and describe one of the following types of elder abuse: physical, sexual, mental/emotional/verbal, pharmacological, or financial. Explain strategies for identifying this abuse. Then, explain how you would proceed based on your local and state laws once you have identified this abuse in a patient. Describe resources in your community that assist victims of this type of abuse and explain how you, as the advanced practice nurse, might apply these resources for abused elders who are identified in the clinical setting.

Journal Entry Part 2

For the second part of your journal entry, reflect on the different cultures—ethnic, religious, regional, or generational—of the elder patient population at your practicum site. Describe the cultures you have observed and explain the influence of these cultures on the prevalence and detection of elder abuse. Then, explain how culture might impact the way you would implement resources for preventing or addressing abuse.

ANSWER

Journal 10

Elder Abuse

Elder abuse is any doing that causes harm and distress to an aged person. The act may be repetitive or a single occurrence. It is difficult to notice this form of abuse because most elders are hesitant to report such incidents (Beach et al., 2016). Geriatric individuals are abused in different ways which include physical, emotional, sexually and financially.

 Emotional abuse has been identified to be the most common in most elders. Most aged individuals live with a lot of humiliation from the other family members. They are ridiculed and harassed for not being able to carry out specific tasks on their own. Such actions affect the elderly mentally causing them to suffer emotionally without any physical injuries (Burnes et al., 2015). It is difficult to notice such abuse which has led to the introduction of medical personnel in the identification process to help see the signs.

Change in behaviour, excessive mumbling, self-isolation, and signs of anger are the characteristics which enable medical practitioners to identify a case of emotional abuse in the elderly.

 As a caregiver, I will start by inquiring about the relationship of the elder with the people close to him. Psychological evaluation is then carried out to help determine if the individual is experiencing emotional abuse. The next step will be to change the living environment of the aged individual to a safer place with a different surrounding (Dong, 2015). Medication will also be administered to help the elder relax and cope with the stress.

Homes for the elderly create a favourable environment for nurses to take care of the aged who have gone through abuse (Pillemer, Burnes, Riffin & Lachs, 2016). It gives an opportunity for environmental change from the family setting to a new place where the elderly finds peace and relaxation. In many communities, they believe that an old individual living alone is automatically poor and can also be a witch. This perception makes the society….