Building a Holistic Long-Term Care Model Based on Clients’ Needs
Date Issued
2016
Date
2016
Author(s)
Wu, Tsui-Er
Abstract
Taiwan has the fastest aging population in the world. The government and community are actively constructing a seamless integration of long-term care service network. Hope not only to make the elderly live longer, but also to live well and they can choose where to live. Since the young population in rural areas move out and transportation is not convenient, the relative resources of long-term care are lack. That makes hard to provide services in rural areas. In order to allow the elderly and those with disability can live in their own environment and community to achieve the goal of ""aging in place"", Taiwan Government is actively building long-term care resources in rural areas. Population aging in New Taipei City Shiding District is very serious. 1,427 people are age over 65, which is 18.1% of its total number of population. In addition, 6.7% of the total population are handicapped in this district (526 people). Therefore, it is obvious the long-term care resources are urgently demanded. In this study, in-depth interviews to 18 cases were conducted in order to investigate the needs of long-term care and unmet needs of the elderly and disability. 12 professionals were interviewed to understand the plight and recommendations from the view of service providers. In this study, some results were found either the cases or professionals have pointed out that the biggest long-term care problems are the inconvenience of traffic and the lack of man power and medical resources in Shiding District. The priority is to meet the basic needs of the cases first (body cleansing, nutrition, etc.) because the services cannot be delivered well (less health care service applicants, less service hours) and service resources also reduced. Health assessment, clean environment, accessibility, range of motion exercise (ROM), rehabilitation, social interaction and other needs are less likely to be satisfied. In addition, both overlap each service and few communication between the medical and social work professionals (no communication opportunities and integration platform) increase the cost of services as well as reduce the effect of services. There are several recommendations were made based on the result of the study for the rural areas: to establish the community service center in the area; to conduct long-term care needs assessment; to provide home services, community-based services, and institutions services based on clients’ needs; to provide services from health promotion to total care of disability people; to build small nursing institutions in the area to integrate medical and social welfare services; to establish a network of resources within the community. Through professional integration and delegation of services, the limited resources and manpower can make a greater effect and achieve the goal of holistic care.
Subjects
rural area
the elderly
long-term care
needs
professional integration
SDGs
Type
thesis
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ntu-105-R02847040-1.pdf
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