Categories of Abuse for Vulnerable Adults
Categories of Abuse for Vulnerable Adults
NHS Digital reported that there were over 150,070 adult safeguarding referrals made in 2017-18 from councils that have social services responsibility.
Abuse is defined as “a violation of an individual’s human and civil rights by any other person or persons”.
Vulnerable adults can be abused by family members, friends, care workers, volunteers, other service users or professional staff such as medical staff. Abuse can occur to either one person or to a group of people at the same time, some forms of abuse will constitute a criminal offence, for example rape, assault, theft, or fraud. Abuse can occur in the customer’s own home, a nursing or residential home, hospital, or other care setting.
Abuse is not always deliberate it can occur through carers trying to do their best but not knowing what they should do, such as family members not knowing how they should lift a frail elderly person or simply help them to their feet. Unfortunately, irrespective of how or why the abuse occurs the abusive action causes the vulnerable person harm.
There are many categories of abuse for vulnerable documents and new categories get added all the time however some of the most common abuse types include:
- Physical
- Neglect
- Self Neglect
- Sexual
- Financial
- Psychological and emotional
- Discriminatory
- Institutional