Barriers in detecting elder abuse among emergency medical technicians.
Barriers in detecting elder abuse among emergency medical technicians.
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DOI：
10.1186/s12873-016-0100-7
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发表时间：
2016-09-02
影响因子：
2.5
通讯作者：
Radpour S
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Reingle Gonzalez JM;Cannell MB;Jetelina KK;Radpour S
在美国，虐待和忽视老年人的情况被严重低估。这可能部分归因于尽管国家强制报告涉嫌虐待老年人，但急救医疗技术人员(EMT)的报告率较低。需要有创新的解决办法来解决报告不足的问题。其目的是描述急救医生发现和报告虐待老年人的经验。定性数据来自11名急救医生和12名成人保护服务(APS)个案工作者，他们参加了五个半结构化焦点小组之一。焦点组数据由两个编码者迭代编码。研究结果表明，急诊医生向APS报告虐待老年人的行为存在许多障碍。与会者表示，向他们提供的关于发现或报告虐待老年人的培训有限。急救员建议，可以利用培训、建立自动报告系统或简短的筛查工具来加强急救队发现疑似虐待老年人案件并将其通报给医务人员的能力。本研究的结果表明，急诊医生可能处于独特的位置，可以作为虐待和忽视老年人的监测人员。急救人员渴望与APS合作，解决虐待和忽视老年人的漏报问题，但培训很少，而且鉴于他们作为紧急医疗保健提供者的主要角色，目前的报告程序非常耗时。今后的研究应设法将这些调查结果付诸实践，办法是确定预测虐待和忽视老年人的具体指标，以便纳入急诊医生的自动报告工具。本文的在线版本(doi：10.1186/s12873-0160100-7)包含补充材料，授权用户可以使用。
Elder abuse and neglect are highly under-reported in the United States. This may be partially attributed to low incidence of reporting among emergency medical technicians’ (EMTs), despite state-mandated reporting of suspected elder abuse. Innovative solutions are needed to address under-reporting. The objective was to describe EMTs’ experience detecting and reporting elder abuse. Qualitative data were collected from 11 EMTs and 12 Adult Protective Services (APS) caseworkers that participated in one of five semi-structured focus groups. Focus group data were iteratively coded by two coders. Findings suggest a number of barriers prevent EMTs from reporting elder abuse to APS. Participants suggested that limited training on elder abuse detection or reporting has been provided to them. EMTs suggested that training, creation of an automated reporting system or brief screening tool could be used to enhance EMT’s ability to detect and communicate suspected cases of elder abuse to APS. Results from the present study suggest that EMTs may be uniquely situated to serve as elder abuse and neglect surveillance personnel. EMTs are eager to work with APS to address the under-reporting of elder abuse and neglect, but training is minimal and current reporting procedures are time-prohibitive given their primary role as emergency healthcare providers. Future studies should seek to translate these findings into practice by identifying specific indicators predictive of elder abuse and neglect for inclusion on an automated reporting instrument for EMTs. The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12873-016-0100-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.