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Help-seeking in older crime victims: A mixed-methods study in collaboration with the Metropolitan Police Service

Serfaty, Marc; Billings, Jo; Vickerstaff, Victoria; Lee, Teresa; Buszewicz, Marta; Satchell, Jessica; (2024) Help-seeking in older crime victims: A mixed-methods study in collaboration with the Metropolitan Police Service. PLoS Mental Health , 1 (3) , Article e0000082. 10.1371/journal.pmen.0000082. Green open access

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Abstract

BACKGROUND: There are growing concerns about the psychological impact of community crimes on older victims, but little is known about whether older victims obtain mental health support. OBJECTIVE: To understand: A) whether older crime victims seek help for psychological distress, B) what factors predict help-seeking, and C) the barriers and facilitators to accessing support. METHODS: Our longitudinal mixed-methods study was embedded within the Victim Improvement Package (VIP) trial. Older victims (n = 2,932) were screened for depressive and anxious symptoms with the GAD-2 and PHQ-2 within one month of a crime. Those with significant symptoms (n = 1,170) were provided with letters signposting them to their General Practitioner (GP) (Family Physician). A subsample of older Victims (n = 677) were then re-screened at three months and asked if they had acted on the signposting. Logistic regression was used to examine predictors of help-seeking. Qualitative semi-structured interviews on a sub-sample (n = 27) were undertaken to establish barriers and facilitators to help-seeking and explore views on the signposting letter, and analysed using thematic analysis. RESULTS: Only 13% (n = 85) of distressed older victims approached their GP for help, and only 32% (n = 27) of these received help. Significant predictors of acting on signposting were police-recorded vulnerability (p = 0.01) and severity of continued anxiety at three months’ post-crime (p <0.01). Help seeking appeared to be driven by feeling overwhelmed or a desire to find others with similar experiences. Barriers to help-seeking included accessibility problems and the belief that they should be able to cope. CONCLUSIONS: Despite growing evidence of psychological distress in older crime victims, few receive support. Signposting older victims may be insufficient to improve psychological outcomes and help-seeking barriers suggest more active management is required.

Type: Article
Title: Help-seeking in older crime victims: A mixed-methods study in collaboration with the Metropolitan Police Service
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmen.0000082
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pmen.0000082
Language: English
Additional information: © 2024 Serfaty et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Division of Psychiatry
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > UCL GOS Institute of Child Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > Institute of Epidemiology and Health > Primary Care and Population Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > UCL GOS Institute of Child Health > Population, Policy and Practice Dept
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Division of Psychiatry > Epidemiology and Applied Clinical Research
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10202873
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