Assessment of elder mistreatment in two American Indian samples: psychometric characteristics of the HS-EAST and the Native Elder Life-Financial Exploitation and -Neglect measures.

Although elder mistreatment among ethnic minorities is increasingly gaining attention, our empirical knowledge of this phenomenon among American Indians remains quite limited, especially with respect to measurement. The Shielding American Indian Elders (SAIE) Project used a collaborative approach to explore culturally informed measurement of elder mistreatment in two American Indian elder samples (a Northern Plains reservation and a South Central metropolitan area). The project sought to investigate the performance characteristics of the commonly used Hwalek-Sengstock Elder Abuse Screening Test (HS-EAST), as well as to examine the psychometric properties of a new measure developed to capture culturally salient aspects of mistreatment in American Indian contexts--the Native Elder Life Scale (NELS). Using methods and samples comparable to those in the literature, the HS-EAST performed adequately in these Native samples. The NELS also shows promise for use with this population and assesses different aspects of elder mistreatment than does the HS-EAST.