Riverside County and the University of Riverside, School of Medicine,
have been awarded grant money to support programs to address and to
prevent elder abuse in the County. According to Todd Bellanca, Assistant
Director of the County’s Department of Public Social Services, “Each
year in Riverside County, we receive about 15 000 referrals on abuse or
neglect for our seniors and disabled adults.”

The funding comes from the federal Victims of Crime Act, through
California’s Victim Services and Public Safety Branch, in the State’s
Office of Emergency Services.

The total grant funding to the Medical School is $217,444, of which
$54,430 is going to the County’s DPSS. They will match this amount and
use the combined funds to support the Riverside County Elder Abuse
Forensic Center throughout 2024.

The EAFC is a multidisciplinary team of health care workers and
physicians who work to reduce, if not eliminate elder abuse. Services
offered by the EAFC include, but are not limited to, in-home geriatric
medical assessments, in-home neuropsychological evaluations (capacity
assessments), forensic evaluations case consultations with the EAFC
multidisciplinary team, public outreach, and education.

“It’s a collaboration that’s rooted at UCR, led by Dr. David Franklin
[Neuropsychologist with the UCR, School of Medicine],” said Gene
Kennedy, Senior Public Information Specialist for the DPSS Office of
Communication, in an email to the Town Crier.

“My role on the Elder Abuse Forensic Center is multi-faceted. I actually
go out to the homes and do the capacity assessments, so about 99 percent
of my assessments are done in the home,” Franklin said in a video. “I do
cognitive assessments to look at an individual’s capacity — whether or
not he or she is able to perform his or her activities in daily living.
Or whether they need a lot of assistance doing that.

“The purpose of capacity assessment is to get ideas. Do they need more
help? Is there someone that should be taking over the finances? Or
taking over herself to make sure that she’s well cared for?” Franklin
continued. “Then we go back to the center and get an idea of what kind
of services that person needs, [such as] does he or she really need
guardianship or are there other type of services? Do they need a payee?
Or are there other support services like whether they need help with
mental health.”

The EAFC will also provide geriatric services to help manage acute or
chronic conditions especially for patients who struggle with multiple
conditions, multiple medical problems and medications, according to Dr.
Wael Hamade, of the Geriatric Medicine Division at the Riverside
University Health System, Medical Center.

There is also focus on individuals who have recurrent emergency room
visits and hospitalization. Home visits especially are important for
these people and patients, especially if they are homebound.

“So, we really need to assess their functional status and if they have
any impairment or we screen for any risk factor for functional
impairments,” Hamade stressed. “Really the goal is to prevent them from
hospitalization or nursing home placement.”

Another important use of these funds is support for the County’s annual
Elder Abuse Symposium, Kennedy added. “Community members that
participate will provide information on how to identify, investigate,
and prosecute cases involving elder and dependent adult abuse.”

The Elder Abuse Symposium is an annual event. It’s held in June, Elder
Abuse Awareness Month, according to Kennedy. Its website can be found at
rivcodpss.org/symposium.

Among the sessions at this year’s symposium was one called “Embodied
labs.” This is a virtual reality opportunity allowing the participants
to view the world through the perspective of disabled older adults and
caregivers.

Another session addressed techniques to improve case investigation and
evidence. The presenter was Maureen DuMouchel, deputy District Attorney
IV, in the County’s Special Prosecutions Region, focusing on major elder
abuse.

“Seniors will frequently rely on maybe a family member or a close
personal friend to help them with managing their money. Unfortunately, a
lot of people will take advantage of that,” DuMouchel said in the video.
“They’ll start to isolate the senior from their bank accounts. The
senior won’t know what their money is being spent on. Before they know
it they’ve had credit cards opened in their name, money has been pulled
out of the bank account and they’ve lost basically all of their money.”

These investigations are very challenging, many of the professionals
have noted. So this session emphasized how to improve investigative
strategies to build strong cases. A third session focused on the
frequent efforts to defraud seniors.

If you are aware of or believe you recognize elder abuse occurring in a
skilled nursing or assisted living facility, you can contact the
County’s Long-Term Carer Ombudsman Program at 833-772-6624.