Risk Factors Associated with Elder Financial Abuse

Abstract

While data on elder abuse is lacking, a report by AIFS (2015) suggests that between 2% and 14% of older Australians are likely to experience elder abuse in any given year. Elder abuse describes a broad range of abuse, however, the most common type experienced by elderly people is financial abuse (WHO, 2015). Higher relative wealth, physical and mental health problems are contributing to the increased risk of elder financial abuse (Kemp & Mosqueda, 2005). The impact of elder financial abuse is a significant issue as elderly victims suffer a greater impact of financial losses as they have neither the time nor the capacity to recover from the economic loss and may not be able to support living expenses (Darzins, Lowndes, Wainer, Owada, & Mihaljcic, 2010). Accordingly, this project aims to quantify the dynamics of elder abuse. Utilising complaint data reported to the Aged & Disability Advocacy Australia (ADAA) Queensland network, we analysed the complaints relating to elder financial abuse and quantify the range of factors associated with it. Identification of the ‘hotspots’ can help service providers train staff to detect financial abuse and governments can use it to trial awareness campaigns.