Elder Abuse Problems: Implementing Health Policies

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Introduction

Health and healthcare disparities exist; therefore, many public and private entities have sought to narrow the disparities, especially among ethnic and racial minorities. However, the elderly in society form a new kind of minority that is facing challenges of elderly abuse. This is a social problem where older people are prevented from living in dignity. Those who are abused lack a way of participating fully in society. Currently, coordination and management of elderly abuse cases in the United States occur at the federal level. Knowledge of the issue is not well dispersed in society. The planned legislative visit will include presentation of facts on increasing elderly population, highlighting the need for increased funding for health care institutions that provide elderly care, and increased surveillance by nursing inspectors in the current state of care provided for the elderly by professionals or family members. The preferred outcome is to have more policies encouraging the hiring of nursing professionals to offer regulated professional care to the elderly in society.

Articulation of Key Strategies Involved in the Plan, Message, and Recommendations

Past interventions and results

The Elder Justice Act, enacted in 2010 as part of the Affordable Care Act empowered the federal government to come up with initiatives for dealing with elderly abuse. As a result, the Elder Justice Coordinating Council is not a permanent body. It functions under the leadership of the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, which makes it a relevant body for nurses and nursing organization to work with. Moreover, the Council works directly with policy makers, stakeholders, and the public to achieve goals of awareness, prevention, and intervention or response to elderly abuse, which can also occur as a form of neglect and exploitation. The intervention has increased federal government focus on the issue of elderly abuse and has set in motion the trend for a particular federal organization to incorporate measures of discoursing elderly abuse in their line of operation.

An important component of the clinical practice is assessment and recognition of elderly mistreatment and in recent years, it has become in health care and social service delivery in the United States. Therefore, it is important for nurses who carry out the duty of delivering health care (Falk, Baigis & Kopac, 2015).

Policymaker identified

Congressman Matt Cartwright is an identified policymaker who is likely to be receptive to the message of the policy brief. He publicly supports senior issues, with the health of elders being one of the forefront policy considerations of the Congressman. The policymaker successfully introduced legislation affecting seniors. Access is available by phone and through official website feedback.

Plan for legislative visit when, where, and how

The legislative visit will happen as soon as a policymaker identified available, which can be any time after a month. It will take place in the policy maker’s office as an appointment unless the policymaker prescribes another location. To obtain an appointment, a preliminary brief and cover letter seeking appointment will be presented in person to the policy maker’s office.

The Message

Americans are living longer, but older Americans are increasingly facing challenges due to technological advancements and changes in lifestyles. Their biggest risk is elderly abuse where their family caregivers manipulate them, take advantage of their weakness and even neglect them in addition to carrying out other types of abuse. Based on this fact, it is important to continue with efforts to prevent identity and respond to elderly abuse throughout the United States. A number of organizations and individuals are already involved in elderly justice, which is the collective action of restoring dignitary to senior citizen care in the country.

Elderly abuse can happen at home or in long-term care facilities and a main reason for the occurrence is the dependence on non-professional and volunteer caregivers who are mostly related to an elderly person receiving care. Unfortunately, much of the population is unable to detect cases of elderly abuse, and victims are affected by social stereotypes and misinformation that hampers their resolve to report their abuse. Currently, 1 in 10 elderly people in the United States experience elderly abuse as documented in a research report done by Acierno et al. (2010) in the National Elderly Mistreatment Study.

According to the National Center for Elder Abuse (2014), about 40 million people in America are over the age of 65, and about 8 million people are over the age of 85. In two decades, the number of people in the United States aged above 65 will be about 60 million and those aged above 85 will be about 10 million, and from there, the numbers are expected to rise steeply due to advancement in health care. The demand for elderly care will continue to rise, and the country must act now before cases of elderly abuse reach a catastrophic scale (National Center for Elder Abuse, 2014).

The current elderly home bed capacity of 1,736,645 beds is not enough to meet the demand of 10 million elderly people above the age of 85. The additional 1,212,015 beds provided by Board & Care homes are only a fraction of what is needed. As a result, only 3.2 million people live in long-term care facilities where they get professional care, while the rest of the elderly depend on family caregivers (Face sheet, 2012). There is a need to increase budgetary support for elderly nursing homes to increase the overall capacity of beds and nurses.

Recommendations

The message being conveyed is that sound health policies and adequate funding of health facilities for the elderly will provide the structural framework for overcoming elderly abuse problems. Currently, systematic understaffing, overworking of nurses, underpayment, and severe working conditions all contributed to the present state of affairs. Protocols should protect the elderly for identifying and managing abuse and guarantees prescribed caregivers should meet minimum care satisfaction levels. Lastly, there should be increased visits by nursing inspectors to care homes and residents of elderly people to help in identification of elderly abuse at early stages. The visit is meant to ask the policymaker to take the official initiative of pushing through the recommendation of the relevant levels of government to achieve the expected outcome.

Plan for Conveying the Message

To convey my message, I have to consider the office hours of the policymaker, the ongoing events that affect his/her availability, and protocols for obtaining an appointment. In addition, I have to consider email, video conferencing and telephone interviews as contingency plans. There is a chance of having to make the visit in stages, which means there is concern about being able to break down my presentations into segments to correspond to channels used for delivery. It is possible to include facts about aging population, cases of elderly abuse, a list of intervening groups and organization. These data in the presentation will increase the urgency of the message and inspire the participation of the policymaker.

Expectation from Policymaker and Follow-up Strategy

The expectation is that the policymaker will raise the issue with other policymakers during their assembly. In this regard, letters written to news editors highlighting the meeting and the elderly abuse problem will be appropriate. A report on the visit and matters discussed, as well as hopes for the future will also be sent to nursing associations’ websites to sensitize members and increase the public discussions on the issue.

Analysis of Approach Strategies

Targeting a congressional representative for advocating a policy change has worked in the past, as many legislation passed in Congress end up becoming part of federal and state government policies. At the same time, congressional representatives have offices that allow them to meet members of the public. Therefore, it is possible to have a meeting and discusses the issue of elderly abuse and intended outcomes. The reception of the elderly care issue should be a positive one, given the congressional representative identified for this legislative visit holds seniors’ welfare dearly. Also, being a nursing professional and having sufficient facts to present will be added advantages. The congressional representative is available through offices in Washington and others located throughout Pennsylvania. Besides, there are phone numbers and a website where follow-ups can take place (Senior issues, 2015).

A successful visit will increase the relevancy of the subject and act as a cue for congressional committees to look into nurses’ contribution to elderly care. The focus will help highlight the plight of patients and nurses alike and improve working conditions when staffing and institutional capacity problems are addressed.

Conclusion

Positive outcomes of the legislature visit will include public support by policy makers. The support should be for increases in federal and state budgetary allocation for community health programs and nursing homes. These should lead to increased intergenerational interventions and community projects involving nurses that sensitize society and raise awareness of elderly abuse.

References

Acierno, R., Hernandez, M., Amstadter, A., Resnick, H., Steve, K., Muzzy, W., & Kilpatrick, D. (2010). Prevalence and correlates of emotional, physical, sexual, and financial abuse and potential Neglect in the United States: The National Elder Mistreatment Study. Am J Public Health, 100(2), 292-297.

Face sheet: Abuse of residents of long term care facilities. (2012). Web.

Falk, N., Baigis, J., & Kopac, C. (2015). Elder Mistreatment and the Elder Justice Act. OJIN: The Online Journal of Issues In Nursing, 17(3).

National Center for Elder Abuse. (2014). America’s growing elderly population. Web.

Senior issues. (2015). Web.

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