Introduction
Long-term care is an important aspect of the health system, and despite its importance and inevitable necessity, the context of Long-term care services can be often misunderstood. In that sense the type of Long-term care services, the Long-term care facilities and the implemented health insurance sometimes can be unfamiliar for most of the people. This paper discusses the various types of Long-term care in terms of the services, their differences and the customers who are entitled to receive Long-term care.
Analysis
Long-term care can be defined as the assistance for people who are unable to take care for themselves due to chronic illnesses and disabilities. (” What Is Long Term Care”) Long-term care can be divided into many groups depending on factors considered. For example, Long-term care “can be provided either through institutions or in the community; can include both formal (i.e., generally paid and often specialized) and informal (i.e., generally unpaid and often unspecialized) care; and that formal care can have either public or private funding.” (Laurence).
In regards of the characteristics of the Long-term care, they can include, but not limited to:
- Nursing Homes –includes a wide range of services, including personal and health care. Usually these facilities provide care when there is no possibility for in-home or in-community care. This type of Medicare as most type nursing home care is not covered in Medicare. (“Nursing Homes “).
- Home Care – This type of Long-term care include many type of service provided at home to “recovering, disabled, chronically or terminally ill persons in need of medical, nursing, social, or therapeutic treatment and/or assistance with the essential activities of daily living.”() The customers entitled of this type of service vary from elderly and disabled, such as in Health Aide, to terminally ill, such as in Hospice, and people who require safety administration in their house, such as in Home Repair and Modifications. Medicare covers some services depending on states insurance plans and physicians’ certificate. (“What Is Home Care?”).
- Assisted living facilities – this type of Long-term care generally refer to physical assistance in facilities in apartment or residential style. The difference from other types is that the facilities are equipped with personal and health related services, while retaining the setting of a house. In that sense it can be considered as an intermediate choice between nursing homes and home health care. The services offer health aid, as well as social and recreational activities, where the fees for the apartment might be separated from the services. (“Assisted Living Facilities Information & Senior Care”).
- Continuing Care Retirement Communities –a Long-term care which provide all of the aforementioned depending on the customer. The main difference is that the customer signs a long term contract for the remainder of one’s life, and as the needs change with aging the customer might move within the aforementioned. facilities. Literally, any customer can be entitled for such facility, but in practice, mostly senior people apply for such service. (“Continuing Care Retirement Communities”)
Conclusion
It can be seen that Long-term care is diverse in the types of facilities and services offered. In that sense, Long-term care can be considered as a broad term under which many people mistakenly can imply other types of care and accordingly other services.
Works Cited
- “Assisted Living Facilities Information & Senior Care“. 2009. Assisted Living Directory. Web.
- “Continuing Care Retirement Communities”. 2008. Help Guide.
- Laurence, G. Branch. “Community Long-Term Care Services: What Works and What Doesn’t?” The Gerontologist 41.3 (2001): 305.
- “Nursing Homes “. 2009. Medicare.
- “What Is Home Care?”. 2009. National Association for Home care and Hospice.
- ” What Is Long Term Care”. 2007. All About Long Term Care.