Journal of

Introduction and purpose: Elder abuse is an important health problem that is becoming a major social issue in the near future due to increase number of older population.  The purpose of this study was to assess elder abuse and its dimensions in day care centers.

 Materials and Methods:This cross sectional study was conducted among elderly utilizing day care services in rehabilitation institute of Mohhamad Shahr city. The elder abuse questionnaire was used to collect data from 65 seniors and data were analyzed by descriptive and inferential statistics.

Findings: Findings from this study confirmed existence of elder abuse in seniors utilizing day care services. The most prevalent type of elder abuse attributed to mental abuse followed by financial abuse, neglect and lastly physical abuse. Our findings revealed that single elderly women are more vulnerable to abuse. Additionally, we found that the likelihood of becoming a victim of elder abuse increases with age (P< 0.05).

Conclusion: Elder abuse exists in the society but victims are often hidden because of cultural reasons. There is no official statistics on magnitude of the elder abuse due to lack of  formal institutes to disseminate such information.   Rehabilitation centers are places where different types and extent of possible abuse can be recognized. Caring professions such as nursing, social work, psychology and medicine can implement three level of prevention. Furthermore, interdisciplinary interaction of such professions plays an effective role on interventions of elderly rehabilitation team.