- [Announcer] Npt Reports: Aging Matters.

- Hello, this is Renee with Adult Protective Services.

How may I help you?

Tennessee is a mandatory reporting state.

Meaning everyone, all citizens who suspect abuse, neglect, or financial exploitation of vulnerable adults must report to Adult Protective Services.

APS has a hotline, we're open 24/7.

We take reports all hours of the day.

Once you make a report to Adult Protective Services, first thing that we do is notify other agencies that might need to be involved.

Then, the second thing that we do is go visit the victim, the alleged victim, and find out what's going on, and find out what their needs are.

How can we help?

We do an assessment.

We look at their environment, their finances, any signs of abuse or neglect.

I encourage everyone to report.

Sometimes victims can't report for themselves.

They may not know who to report.

They may not know what will happen.

They may have unrealistic fears of what's gonna happen if they report, like they think the state may come in and take away their independence.

Everyone wants to remain independent and that's our goal.

So if you make a report, that's our goal.

It's to make sure that folks can live with dignity and independent as long as possible and be free from abuse or neglect.

We can make a referral to partners such as CREVAA, which is a Collaborative Response to Elder and Vulnerable Adult Abuse.

And they can go in and provide services and even some monetary services if needed.

So justice may look different depending on the victim.

Some victims may want to prosecute the alleged perpetrator whereas some victims only want some protective services.

I think the justice that we can provide is the support because all adults have a right to be safe, valued, heard, and treated with dignity and respect.

And here at APS, we do that by being a trustworthy resource for and effective.

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