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Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2439
igaa057.2439
Abstracts
Session 6145 (Symposium)
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
Elder Abuse Multidisciplinary Teams: Describing and Classifying a Key Collaborative Resource for APS Workers
Gassoumis Zachary  Galdamez Gerson  Rowan Julia  Wilber Kathleen  
University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, United States

2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”696 696
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
Elder abuse multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) are a key resource when APS workers address their most complex cases. MDTs promote coordination and information sharing, and provide access to highly specialized input and problem-solving from legal, health, social service, and financial fields. This paper characterizes the range of elder abuse MDTs across the U.S. We identified 324 MDTs in the U.S., which most frequently addressed cases of financial exploitation (90.8%), physical abuse (83.6%) and neglect (81.6%). Based on a follow-up survey, latent class analysis was used to determine closeness of a subset (n=91) to the elder abuse forensic center model, which has received much evaluation and policy attention. Twenty-six showed strong similarity to forensic centers, with 24 others showing partial similarity. Coupled with observations from site visits to 4 teams, findings can guide the development and evaluation of elder abuse MDTs to foster better interdisciplinary collaboration for APS workers. Part of a symposium sponsored by Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of Elderly People Interest Group.