Financial Exploitation of the Elderly
No national reporting mechanism exists for tracking the financial exploitation of elders. According to a 1998 study by the National Center on Elder Abuse, financial abuse accounted for about 12 percent of all elder abuse reported nationally in 1993 and 1994 and 30.2 percent of substantiated elder abuse reports submitted to Adult Protective Services in 1996 after excluding reports of self-neglect (National Center on Elder Abuse, 1998). A 2000 survey of the National Association of Adult Protective Services Administrators conducted for the National Center on Elder Abuse (Teaster, 2003) found that financial exploitation comprised 13 percent of the mistreatment allegations investigated. Many experts in the field, however, believe that the level of elder exploitation may well exceed what has been reported to authorities and documented by researchers.
Works Cited
National Center on Elder Abuse. "The National Elder Abuse Incidence Study." Final report to the Administration on Children and Families and Administration on Aging, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Grant No. 90–AM–0660, 1998.
23(4): Summer 2002. Washington, DC: American Bar Association.
Teaster, P.B. A Response to the Abuse of Vulnerable Adults: The 2000 Survey of State Adult Protective Service (pdf, 85 pages). Washington, DC: National Center on Elder Abuse, 2003.