Violência contra os idosos: perfil epidemiológico das notificações no estado da Paraíba.

Abstract

Introduction: Population aging, one of the major trends of the present time, has reflected in the increase of the practice of violence against the elderly. Defined as an act or omission that results in impairments in physical and emotional integrity, and in losses in its social role performance, violence against this population is an important public health problem in Brazil. Objective: To analyze the epidemiological profile of reports of violence against the elderly in the state of Paraíba, from 2011 to 2014. Methodology and method: this is an ecological, retrospective, descriptive study with a quantitative approach. Cases of domestic violence, sexual violence and/or other violence registered by Paraíba in the Notification of Invalidity Information System (SINAN) and made available in the Department of Information Technology of SUS (DATASUS) were analyzed. The data were analyzed in the program Microsoft Office Excel 2010 for elaboration of tables, containing the absolute value and percentage. Results: In the period from 2011 to 2014, 977 cases of violence against the elderly were registered, female (56.1%), color/brown race (86.2%) prevailed, and 48.4% of the notifications did not inform the schooling of the victims. Regarding the type of violence, neglect/abandonment (64.7%) and physical abuse (33.1%) were the highlights. Regarding the characteristics of the occurrences, it was noticed that most of the notifications did not specify the means of aggression used, maltreatment occurred mainly in the residences (70.8%), 96.2% evolved to high, prevailed the referrals to the ambulatory sectors (75.2%), the percentage of self-inflicted injuries was only 3.6%, and a large part of the records (81.4%) did not report whether the elderly had previously been raped. When analyzing the data about the aggressor, the lack of information was again evidenced. Nevertheless, of the few cases that identified the type of relationship between aggressor and victim, unknown authors (11.4%) are noteworthy. In 87.4% of the records, it is not known whether there was supposed alcohol consumption. Conclusion: The results reinforce trends identified in other studies that, for instance, highlight the predominance of female elderly in the occurrence of maltreatment. The limitation for this research was the fragility of the information available in SINAN-NET, pointing to the need to improve notifications. Finally, this study is expected to contribute to the recognition of the manifestation of this problem in the lives of the longevity and it is suggested that new studies addressing the theme be developed, in order to more accurately measure the real dimension of this problem in Paraíba, as well as in the country.