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Responses from 140 nursing schools indicated that most taught health assessment to nurse practitioners as a separate course; public institutions were more involved in computer-assisted instruction. Faculty cited scarce resources and limited time to develop new teaching strategies. Most agreed that graduate courses should focus on differential diagnosis and abnormal findings. (Contains 17 references.) (SK)

21 men and 76 women between the ages of 68.0 and 97.0 yr. were administered the Geriatric Scale of Recent Life Events, the Jenkins Activity Survey, the Framingham Type A Scale, and a measure designed to assess factors in the environment believed to contribute to the development and maintenance of the Type A Behavior Pattern. Differences were found between the environment of old age and the retrospective middle-age environment. Results support that Type A behavior emerges in response to environmental elicitors.

Elder mistreatment is unrecognized, hidden, and underreported. Studies show that health professionals, nurses among them, are largely unaware of the various forms of elder mistreatment that take place and of the proper course of action to pursue when mistreatment is suspected. In this article, we describe elder mistreatment policies, examining them in the light of the United States national elder abuse policies with a focus on important provisions of the Elder Justice Act. Next, we review the various types of abuse, the identification of abuse, and the nurses role in addressing elder mistreatment. We present an example of a case of physical abuse and conclude by discussing nurses' advocacy role and issuing a call to action, challenging nurses to ‘"act now" to protect the well being of elders.