About A Helping Voice 

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Every day, thousands of hours of older Mainers’ caregiving needs are going unmet. The toll is immense for these older Mainers and their families. Caregivers—often middle-aged daughters—are losing sleep, missing work, and abandoning their careers altogether. Families must figure out ways to provide for their loved ones, often leaving holes in their care and increasing the older adults’ risk for elder abuse, neglect, self-neglect, and financial exploitation.

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Home health workers are a foundation of care in most communities. Some provide therapy or meet nursing needs, others cook, clean, or help older adults care for their own daily needs. These workers are a keystone to helping older Mainers age in their homes and communities, serving as a backstop for families in need.

Home health workers are also state-mandated reporters for elder abuse. As the on-the-ground eyes and ears for detecting elder abuse, they are perfectly positioned to protect older Mainers by notifying Adult Protective Services (APS) when they see signs of abuse, neglect, and exploitation.

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The limited research that exists on mandated reporting of elder abuse focuses on settings where victims come for services—emergency departments, physician offices, banks—not on the home setting where abuse is occurring. There is little known about home health workers’ experiences and perceptions of mandated reporting, and virtually nothing about how these might differ in rural communities.

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With the support of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Interdisciplinary Research Leaders program, we are working to change this. In addition to  conducting focus groups with home health workers in rural and urban communities across Maine, collecting vital information about the realities of mandated reporting of elder abuse, we have launched A Helping Voice, a confidential phone service which provides support to people who have concerns about an older person being mistreated, exploited or neglected and uncertain about whether they should report this to APS.  

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