Why do some medical professionals and other caregivers talk to the elderly as though they are small children, even when their mental faculties are intact?

Caring for elderly parents isn’t very different from caring for kids, say family caregivers to their parents who are getting old. Researchers studied a sample of 426 adult caregiver-daughters to determine the predictors of such perceptions of parent care. The cognitive impairment of the elderly and the perceived burden of caregiving were the most significant indicators of this comparison of elder care to child care.
The first factor is a reaction to the inability of elders, which forces caretakers to undertake a directive, parental role.
The second element can reflect parental criticism; for example, severely stressed caregivers see parent care as kid care even in the absence of cognitive impairment in the seniors.
The findings show that when parents fail to display adult abilities, family caregivers consider parent care similar to child care. As a result, this judgment seems to be a “role breach” rather than “role reversal.”