Discussion
In a newly developed national framework for elder abuse
assessment, the referral rate of elder abuse represents only a
small proportion of the likely total number of cases.
International research suggesting incidence rates between 1
and 5% [3] extrapolates to an incidence from 4,670 to 24,350
in an Irish context. This data needs to be contextualised in
that it only represents referrals to a specialist elder abuse
service in the health service. It does not measure all elder
abuse concerns in Ireland, for example, those that come to
the attention of other professional services including the
police. Additionally this service is in its infancy, it is anticipated
that referrals will increase as awareness both within the
health services and in the general public enhances.
The low rate of reporting may also be influenced by our
system of non-mandatory reporting [5] The National
Incidence Study in the United States [8] determined that
for every case reported and substantiated a further five are
not, highlighting the under-reporting of elder abuse even
with mandatory reporting.