Evaluation of Data Linkage Methodology to Improve Estimates of Elder Mistreatment

描述（由申请人提供）：老年人虐待是一个重要的，研究不足和报告不足的公共卫生问题，并根据美国老年人口迅速增长的国家老龄化研究所的高度优先事项。该项目将评估应用数据链接方法的可行性，该方法曾成功地用于改进对亲密伴侣暴力和虐待儿童的估计，以改进对虐待老年人的发生率和普遍性的估计。目前存在提供关于报告的虐待老年人情况的资料的数据库，但尚未得到充分利用，以使国家和地方了解报告的虐待老年人的程度以及与虐待有关的风险因素。将把国家一级的数据与全国普遍可用的数据库联系起来。数据库包括成人保护服务，医院急诊科和出院，执法/刑事司法，长期护理，以及国家暴力死亡报告系统的RI部分。将获得身体、性和心理虐待受害者以及忽视和经济剥削受害者的不重复计数。将包括居住在社区和机构环境中的老年人。这项研究将填补一个重要的知识空白，通过合并报告来源的虐待老年人报告案件的数据，以提供已知案件的最完整的画面。还将对受害和犯罪的风险因素进行评估，以用于发现以前未被发现的案件。将使用捕获-再捕获方法来估计未报告病例的数量。此外，将召集一个多学科的虐待老年人评估工作组，为每一种虐待老年人的行为制定标准化的业务定义，以便跨学科适用。拟议的方法有希望作为方法，可以在全国范围内应用，并与调查数据配合使用，大大提高了对虐待老年人的发生率和流行率的估计。 这一应用将填补我们知识中的一个重要空白，将报告来源中报告的虐待老年人案件的数据结合起来，为我们提供已知案件的最完整的情况。在开展这项工作之前，我们将不知道来自个别来源的案件在所有报告的虐待老年人案件中的代表性如何。有了这些信息和今后收集的调查数据，我们最终将更清楚地了解人口中虐待老年人的程度，并掌握制定和针对更有效的公共卫生干预措施所必需的信息。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Elder mistreatment is an important, understudied and under-reported public health problem and a high priority for the National Institute on Aging in light of the burgeoning United States elderly population. This project will evaluate the feasibility of applying data linkage methodology used successfully to improve estimates of intimate partner violence and child maltreatment to improve estimates of incidence and prevalence of elder mistreatment. Databases that provide information on reported elder mistreatment currently exist but have not been utilized to full advantage to provide both a national and local understanding of the extent of reported elder mistreatment and risk factors associated with mistreatment. Linkage of state-level data from databases generally available nationally will be conducted. The databases include Adult Protective Services, hospital Emergency Department and Hospital Discharge, Law Enforcement/Criminal Justice, Long Term Care, and the RI component of the National Violent Death Reporting System. Unduplicated counts of victims of physical, sexual, and psychological abuse as well as victims of neglect and financial exploitation will be obtained. Elders residing in both community and institutional settings will be included. This study will fill an important gap in knowledge by combining data on reported cases of elder mistreatment across reporting sources to afford the most complete picture possible of known cases. Risk factors for victimization and perpetration will also be assessed for use in detection of previously unrecognized cases. Capture-recapture methodology will be utilized to estimate the number of unreported cases. In addition, a multi-disciplinary Elder Mistreatment Assessment Working Group will be convened to develop standardized operational definitions for each type of elder mistreatment that can be applied across disciplines. The proposed methodology holds promise as methodology that could be applied nationally and, used in concert with survey data, significantly improve estimates of the incidence and prevalence of elder mistreatment. This application will fill an important gap in our knowledge by combining data on reported cases of elder mistreatment across reporting sources to afford us the most complete picture possible of known cases. Until this work is undertaken we will not know how representative cases from individual sources are of the population of all reported cases of elder mistreatment that occur. With this information and collection of survey data in the future, we will finally have a clearer picture of the extent of elder mistreatment in the population and have the information essential to develop and target more effective public health interventions.