State officials said a new study looking at the financial exploitation of Oregon’s oldest residents will help them focus their outreach and prevention efforts so they can better fight this problem.

It also sheds light on a previously unnoticed type of financial exploitation that could cost the state and its long-term care system more than $1 million a year, according to the state’s estimates.

“This is an area of concern,” said Rebecca Fetters, an operations and policy analyst with the Department of Human Services who put together the financial exploitation study.

Released this month, the study marks the second time since 2012 state officials have taken a detailed look at a year’s worth of financial exploitation cases.

This type of elder abuse involves theft of an older person’s money and assets or use of them for a purpose that does not directly support his or her well-being.

According to the study, the 3,398 financial exploitation cases officials with the state’s Adult Protective Services Program investigated in 2013 made up 41 percent of their total caseload.

This makes financial exploitation the most common type of elder abuse reported in that year.

The number of financial exploitation cases grew by 18 percent from 2012 to 2013. Both verbal and physical abuse grew at a higher rate, 28 percent and 23 percent, respectively, year over year, according to the report.

“That was surprising,” Fetters said, explaining the state will probably take a detailed look at these two types of abuse if the increases continue.

The Department of Human Services is finishing a second report, to be released next month, that will take a broad look at every abuse case it handled in 2013, she added.

Fetters said another surprising tidbit from the state’s report involves situations in which an older person gives a friend or a loved one access to money with the understanding he or she will use it to pay the older person’s bills while he stays at a nursing home or another long-term care facility.

“It turns out that instead of using (the older person’s) money to pay for their care, (these people) are using it for some other purpose,” Fetters said, explaining the victims of this type of abuse might not realize what is going on until their long-term care facility threatens to evict them because they owe thousands of dollars in back payments.

Fetters said this type of abuse, which she calls facility nonpayment, is extremely rare and popped up in about 4 percent of the financial exploitation cases her agency reviewed.

Facility nonpayment happened to about 130 people in 2013, according to Fetters’ estimates, and it was costly; the average victim lost about $12,600. This translates into a total loss of more than $1.1 million that the state’s Medicaid program and its network of long-term care facilities had to absorb, because it’s almost impossible to get stolen money back once it’s been spent.

Fetters said she did not have any immediate suggestions for ways facility nonpayment could be prevented, but she said her office will take a closer look at this type of abuse when it puts together its next in-depth report on financial exploitation.

During an interview this week, Fetters raised a red flag when it comes to power of attorney, a legal arrangement that under certain circumstances gives one person the ability to make financial decisions on another person’s behalf.

The study found one-third of the people who were accused of committing financial exploitation in 2013 had power of attorney over their victims, and that status might have helped them commit their crimes. The state’s 2012 review found that one-fourth of the people who were accused of committing financial exploitation in 2011 had power of attorney over their victims.

Because of this increase, Fetters said, state officials should look at ways that they could increase their oversight over how power of attorney is assigned, what a person can do once he takes control over a person’s estate and finances, and whether a system of checks and balances is needed to make sure people do not abuse their powers over someone else.

Fetters also said the state should take a second look at how it trains mandatory reporters — doctors, law enforcement officers and other professionals who are legally required to report any suspected cases of elder abuse to the proper authorities — because 40 percent of 2013’s financial exploitation cases were referred from one of their offices.

She said an increased training regimen, or even just a simple reminder of why someone’s duty to report elder abuse is important, will make it easier for the state’s investigators to start working on a suspected case of financial exploitation before too much damage is done.

Finally, Fetters said the state should look at reaching out to two other groups of potential reporters — home health care workers and Medicaid eligibility personnel — because they are also in positions where they might pick up on signs that could indicate elder abuse.

— Reporter: 541-617-7816, mmclean@bendbulletin.com