Quantifying Risk of Financial Incapacity and Financial Exploitation in Community-dwelling Older Adults: Utility of a Scoring System for the Lichtenberg Financial Decision-making Rating Scale. Issue 3 (3rd May 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Lichtenberg, Peter A.; Gross, Evan; Ficker, Lisa J.
• Is Part Of: Clinical gerontologist. Volume 43:Issue 3(2020)
• Page Start: 266
• Page End: 280
• Publication Date: 2020-05-03
• Subjects: Cognitive decline -- financial decision making -- financial exploitation -- person centered; Geriatrics -- Periodicals; Geriatric psychiatry -- Periodicals; Older people -- Mental health services -- Periodicals; Older people -- Psychology -- Periodicals; 618.97689
• DOI: 10.1080/07317115.2018.1485812
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0731-7115

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Objectives : This work examines the clinical utility of the scoring system for the Lichtenberg Financial Decision-making Rating Scale (LFDRS) and its usefulness for decision making capacity and financial exploitation. Objective 1 was to examine the clinical utility of a person centered, empirically supported, financial decision making scale. Objective 2 was to determine whether the risk-scoring system created for this rating scale is sufficiently accurate for the use of cutoff scores in cases of decisional capacity and cases of suspected financial exploitation. Objective 3 was to examine whether cognitive decline and decisional impairment predicted suspected financial exploitation. Methods : Two hundred independently living, non-demented community-dwelling older adults comprised the sample. Participants completed the rating scale and other cognitive measures. Results : Receiver operating characteristic curves were in the good to excellent range for decisional capacity scoring, and in the fair to good range for financial exploitation. Conclusions : Analyses supported the conceptual link between decision making deficits and risk for exploitation, and supported the use of the risk-scoring system in a community-based population. Clinical Implications : This study adds to the empirical evidence supporting the use of the rating scale as a clinical tool assessing risk for financial decisional impairment and/or financial exploitation.