Organisational aspects of elder mistreatment in long term care

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose five organisational factors associated with abuse, neglect and/or loss of dignity of older people resident in care homes. It derives from one set of findings from the ResPECT Study of Organisational Dynamics of Elder Care commissioned by Comic Relief and Department of Health through the Prevention of Abuse and Neglect In the Care of Older Adults programme. Design/methodology/approach – A knowledge synthesis method was selected to identify organisational aspects of elder mistreatment in residential care settings. The method was selected for its suitability in examining ill-defined and contested concepts such as; elder mistreatment – where the available evidence is dispersed and produced in varied forms. A rapid review comprising a search of three academic databases and a detailed examination of selected investigation reports into institutional mistreatment was followed by panel meetings with subject matter experts to complete the knowledge synthesis. Findin...