Older victims of sexual assault: an underrecognized population.

Abstract

We performed this study to determine if sexual assault characteristics differ in women presenting for evaluation as women age. All females 20 years or older presenting after sexual assault to an urban emergency department during a nine year period underwent standardized evaluation. Analysis was performed by chi(2). We evaluated 2399 women: 1743 women 20-39 years, 554 women 40-55 years, and 102 women over 55 years of age. Compared with the other age groups, older women were more commonly assaulted in their own home (36%) or care facility (33%), P < .001, assaulted by a service provider (16.7%) or stranger (18.6%), P < .001, impaired (54.9%), P < .001, admitted to the hospital (15.7%), P < .001, incur genital trauma (35.6%), P = .04, and less likely to have a weapon used (7.8%), P = .003. Sexual assault in older women has distinct characteristics, which may be useful in planning intervention and prevention strategies.