Mistreatment of Elderly Prevalent According to Study

A University of Chicago study reveals that approximately 13 percent of elderly Americans experience some sort of mistreatment. The most common form of abuse was verbal, experienced by 9 percent of elderly Americans, then financial mistreatment, experienced by 3.5 percent, and then physical abuse, reported by .2 percent of the elderly.

“The population of the country is aging, and people now live with chronic diseases longer. So it’s important to understand, from a health perspective, how people are being treated as they age,” said lead author Edward Laumann, the George Herbert Mead Distinguished Service Professor in Sociology at the University of Chicago.

The study revealed variations in the abuse, depending on age and ethnicity, and females were twice as likely to report verbal mistreatment.

The complete study can be accessed here.

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