Rotas críticas de mulheres idosas em situação de violência : o caminho percorrido até o atendimento na rede de proteção

Abstract

Violence against women is a phenomenon without frontiers of social class, race, nationality and age. The greater longevity of women in relation to men favors the fact known as the feminization of old age. There is an urgent need to investigate violence against elderly women as it is a problem that is still invisible. It is not uncommon to suffer a new revitimization when seeking help in the safety net. This study has the general objective of analyzing the critical routes taken by elderly women in situations of violence, from the revelation of the violence suffered to the assistance in the safety net. The specific objectives are: to know the sociodemographic, educational and cultural characteristics; identify the obstacles and facilitators in the search for access to rights; analyze the available (formal and informal) care network; to analyze the factors that hinder or facilitate the articulation of network care to fight violence and to know the perception of elderly women and professionals about violence and the quality of services received by protection network. It is an exploratory-descriptive study, with a qualitative approach, with research conducted based on the critical path method or critical routes. An integrative review on the topic and interviews with 10 elderly women attended by the Integrated Center for the Protection and Defense of the Elderly - CIPDI and by the Specialized Police Station for Crimes against the Elderly - DECCI, as well as with 8 professionals who work in these places were carried out. The data were analyzed based on the textual discourse analysis of Roque Moraes and the results show that, among the factors that hinder the confrontation of violence against elderly women, is the lack of knowledge of what violence is and of recognizing themselves as victims, as well as legislation and services that protect and support them, and the difficulty they have to report it to protect family members or for fear of reprisals. As factors that facilitate the complaint are the state of saturation with the situation experienced and the existence of informal support provided by family members, neighbors and friends, and the formal support provided by the networking institutions, emphasizing the importance of the sheltering and the orientations received in these places so that they decide to take the critical routes in search of access for protection rights when they face any situation of violence. Based on the findings, we defend the thesis that there is an invisibility of the gender dimension in addressing violence against elderly women, as well as in the available literature on violence against the elderly. The wide network of assistance to violence against women existing in the city of Manaus-AM has not been sufficiently accessed by elderly women and the lack of training of professionals in the protection and support network for the elderly from a gender perspective results in obstacles in the fight against experienced violence. It is necessary to promote better training for professionals who assist them in support institutions on issues related to gender violence and to carry out campaigns alluding to violence that include elderly women. Violence against elderly women must become a topic of discussion for effective actions to be proposed to alleviate this serious social and public health problem.