Clinical Characteristics Associated with Physical Violence in the Elderly

Course overview

This course is based upon material published in the Iranian Journal of Public Health and is available as an open-access article. Background: Elder abuse is predicted to increase with the rapid population ageing in many countries. Violent injury is influenced by individual factors as well as interpersonal and social relationships, with different manifestations based on changes in the socioeconomic position of older adults. We comparatively investigated the clinical and injury characteristics of physical violence in the elderly with those in another age group. Methods: We included elderly patients (age greater than or equal to 65 years) who visited six emergency departments (ED) with violence-induced injuries in 2017. The control group comprised patients aged 45-64 years, selected by 1:2 matching based on hospital and sex. Data were extracted from the National Emergency Department Information System and electronic medical records. Both groups were compared for injury mechanism, injury location, activity during injury, diagnosis, and clinical outcomes. Results: Among the 316,944 patients who presented to the 6 ED, 89,178 (28.1percent) had traumatic injuries, and 1.6percent and 4.5percent of injuries were sustained due to violence in the greater than or equal to 65 and 45-64 year age groups, respectively. There were no significant intergroup differences in the perpetrator (P=0.27), body parts affected (P=0.63), and diagnosis (P=0.23), whereas the older adult group had a significantly higher proportion of traumatic injury by fall (P=0.01), at road and traffic facilities (P=0.01), during work (P=0.01), and multiple injuries (P less than 0.01). Conclusion: The increase in non-regular workers in the elderly after retirement may have increased the risk of traumatic workplace injuries. As workplace injuries may be a new risk factor for physical violence in the elderly, institutional workplace injury prevention policy is needed. This course on elder abuse is designed for social workers, professional counselors, psychologists, nurses, and substance abuse counselors, who do clinical work. In addition, this course is appropriate for beginning, intermediate and advanced level practitioners who wish to develop their knowledge of elder abuse. The course material includes a literature review of social activity and participation in economic activities by older adults. It may also be useful for licensed clinicians who require continuing clinical education courses for license renewal. The course is based on a journal article that includes research. It contains statistical analysis and data that some clinicians enjoy reading and others do not. A significant benefit of reading research-based articles for continuing education is they provide practitioners with the latest findings in their field. Authors: Hoon Lee, Soo Han, Ho Kim, Chung Kim, Hae Lee, Ok Par, Ah Lee Learning Objectives: This course will provide the practitioner with detailed information regarding clinical characteristics associated with physical violence in the elderly. Specifically, a professional will: Identify sources of physical violence towards the elderly. Identify the findings of the analysis. Describe the limitations of the analysis. Citation: Lee, D. H., Han, S. S., Kim, D. H., Kim, E. C., Lee, E. H., Park, J. O., Lee, C. A. (2022). Clinical characteristics associated with physical violence in the elderly: a retrospective multicenter analysis. Iranian journal of public health, 51(1), 79-87.