Goals: describe the main goals of the good practice

Supporting elder people victims of abuse and criminal offences, reducing violence effects – that means to make elderly less vulnerable and to impede them from being victims of future abuses

Target Group: describe on which group the good practice is targeted (for instance, older people themselves, care providers, family etc.)

Elderly people victims of violence and criminal offences

Approach: describe the way in which the good practice is implemented.

• Activities of listening, psychological support and psychotherapeutic interventions: home-visits and social help line
• Activity aimed to facilitate the elderly participation in some recreational- social activities in order to overcome the psychological difficulty due to the criminal offence (admittance in day elder centres – night elder centres – counselling parish centres  or home visits carried out by volunteers in order to avoid social isolation) 
• Health and psychological care to overcome the traumatic and stressful event from a psychological and physical point of view, support activities to complete medical bureaucratic procedures;
• Supporting elderly to go to the ER and to call the general practitioner – if needed it gives the first support of “soft” medical care;
• Supporting them for the medicines and foods purchase in order to facilitate them to return to their normal life, this activity is usually carried out by volunteers operating at local level;
• Supporting them in requesting copy of personal documents / IDs through the collaboration of the Public Administration and the Police; 
• Legal assistance in reporting the abuse to the police, facilitating an active legal protection in order to use the free legal aid;
• Counselling about prevention measures; 
• Supporting them to find a solution of practical difficulties such as: house arrangement, keys and door lock replacement, and so on; 
• Free artisan emergency technical service (paid by Municipality of Rome) for over 75 elderly in order to repair material damages (doors and windows) in case of a burglary (under the previous reporting presentation)

Who implements this good practice? Mention, if relevant, the organisation or persons who do the work.

Municipality of Rome – Department V – Social policies Department – Safe Rome Bureau – P.O. Manager Dr. Fernanda Pecoraro 

Internal involved human resources are:

- A Project coordinator (Esq. Barbara Pezzilli) who facilitates the institutional relations among the different involved departments and audits the activities carried out.

- A project manager of the psychological area (Dr. Sara Piscicelli) who controls social and psychological support activities.

External involved human resources are:

70 elder volunteers and a steering professionals technical team (psychologists, social and legal workers)

The service can rely on a dedicated phone number, promoted through newspapers and institutional web sites.

What material is available on this good practice (description, website etc.)

Web site in Italian (The address is complicated – we suggest to search in Google the following words: Comune di Roma + saver)

On line publications:

• material 1
• material 2
• material 3

How widely is this good practice used in your country?

This service is available only within the Municipality of Rome (2.800.000 inhabitants), that has promoted and financed this initiative.

What are the results, outcomes, experiences with this good practice? Please mention the source(s).

More than 10.000 elder people have been met from 2000 (the project starting date) to 2009 (from that date, the service has been incorporated in the local social service. The legal and psychological counselling are still provided by SAVER  in case of criminal offences).  

The victim care support usually starts through a phone call – after that the measures taken by the service depend on the victim (elder) needs:

• Provision of general information about the service in order to orientate the victim
• In case of material damages, the victim will be visited by volunteers, psychologically and legally supported by professional health and legal workers and will be accompanied to the institutional offices for the necessary activities (reporting to the police,  identification documents copy, credit card replacement –if stolen-); the Municipality provides a special agreement with artisans to repair the damaged doors and windows at no cost for the elderly
• In case of physical and emotional harms, if the victim agrees and whenever it’s possible from a legal point of view, the victim can be involved in the social mediation procedures (especially for mistreatments and carelessness cases caused by family members)

Within the project several information campaigns and prevention meetings have been carried out,  especially in those places attended by elder people (Parish – elder social centres –offices run by the national trade unions).

Although a possible victim discouragement can be shown, due to the long last of legal bureaucratic proceedings linked to the reported abuses – (“who knows whether I will still be alive for that date?”, the victims often ask) -, the legal and social care of the service is appreciated because of  its function to quickly achieve the final aim. Thanks to the project activity, elder victims are no alone anymore, in fact they are re-contacted a month after their reporting (but it’s also very common that they contact the service earlier, just to have the possibility to better explain their situation and talk with someone).

Elder people, in order to show their gratitude about this service, often give social operators or counsellors some gifts (a bottle of wine for instance).  The fact that elder people consider this service a point of reference reduces the elderly social isolation and that impedes spiteful persons from taking advantages of their vulnerable conditions. 

In fact this service (visits, phone call…) makes elder feel more protected.

The contact with the elder persons and the second contact (a sort of recall service) have as effect a kind of control that isn’t constant neither and neither too strong and maybe for these characteristics is perceived in a good way by the elder.

(sources: service web site and Esq. Barbara Pezzilli telephone interview)

Are there effect studies? Please mention the source(s) if the answer is ‘yes’.

No

What are the success factors?

The service is managed by Municipality of Rome, legitimating and officially recognizing the project activities, it contributes to overcome the elderly mistrusts.  The proximity of the service is both physical (because care and counselling activities can be brought directly to the elderly home) and metaphoric, because these activities are carried out by elder volunteers who are very next to the victims (they have the same age and they have often experienced the same vulnerable conditions).