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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| The effect of an educational intervention on junior doctors' knowledge and practice in detecting and managing elder abuse | | Author(s) | Claudia Cooper, Lauren Huzzey, Gill Livingston |
| Journal title | International Psychogeriatrics, vol 24, no 9, September 2012 |
| Pages | pp 1447-1453 |
| Source | www.journals.cambridge.org/ipg |
| Keywords | Elder abuse ; Diagnosis ; Doctors ; Teaching hospitals ; Training [welfare work] ; Social surveys. |
| Annotation | Elder abuse is often unreported, undetected and underestimated by professionals. For the first time, the authors report the effectiveness of an educational elder abuse intervention over three months and its impact on professionals' practice. 40 trainee psychiatrists in two London National Health Service trusts completed the KAMA (Knowledge and Management of Elder Abuse) and CSQ (Caregiver Scenario Questionnaire) measuring knowledge about managing and detecting elder abuse, before and immediately after a brief group education session. The trainees were asked how often they considered, asked about, detected and managed elder abuse, and their confidence in doing so, at baseline and three months post-intervention. Compared with baseline, participants scored higher on the KAMA (paired t = 3.4, p = 0.002), and identified more definitely abusive (t = 3.0, p = 0.003) and possibly abusive (t = 2.1, p = 0.043) items immediately post-intervention. At 3-month follow up, 24 (60%) participants reported higher confidence in managing abuse (Wilcoxon signed ranks test z = 3.7, p < 0.001) and considered it more frequently (z = 2.8, p = 0.006), but did not ask older people and their carers about abuse more frequently (z = 1.2, p = 0.24). Two (5%, 95% confidence interval 2%-17%) participants detected abuse in the three months before the intervention, compared with 2 (8%, 2%-26%) in the same period after. This brief educational intervention increased trainee psychiatrists' knowledge and vigilance for abuse immediately and after three months. They remained reluctant to ask about abuse for reasons including fear of causing offence or harming the therapeutic relationship and being unsure how to ask people with dementia. The authors postulate that changing doctors' behaviour may require a more complex intervention, focusing on communication skills. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-121026102 A |
| Classmark | QNT: LK7: QT2: V6: QW: 3F |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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