Measures designed to detect elder abuse lack uniformity as a result of having been designed in isolation. To develop and test a uniform index for the identification of elder abuse victims, an analysis of existing abuse identification instruments was conducted. Initially, seven elder abuse identification measures were content analyzed, resulting in the categorization of seven types of abuse: physical abuse, physical neglect, psychological abuse, psychological neglect, material abuse, violations of rights, and risk indicators. The majority of items collected were risk indicators, suggesting that the measures do not detect the presence of actual abuse but rather the individual's vulnerability to that abuse. Physical neglect was the second highest item on the indices (16 percent). To expand the range of possible measures for the five remaining types of abuse, 12 child abuse identification measures were content analyzed and categorized according to the seven classes of abuse. Finally, all items in each of the seven abuse categories on all abuse identification measures were qualitatively analyzed for specific types of items and the nature of the data source. Conclusions and recommendations from the analysis revealed that measures of elder abuse need to distinguish types of abuse and to develop greater specificity in techniques for identifying abuse. Clarification of sources of information a service provider should seek, and a more efficient means for collecting data are needed. Finally, methods for distinguishing abuse from the aging process must be developed. (BL)