The comparison of long-term care (LTC) expenditures is a difficult task. National LTC systems differ widely in terms of eligibility criteria, level of benefits, institutional variety and regional heterogeneity. In this commentary I will first give some general remarks on cross country comparisons. Then I discuss the role of the informal sector which is the most importan...

Long-term care demographic and industry trends challenge provision of effective care and infection prevention. A systematic review was conducted to identify and evaluate cost estimates reported in the scientific literature of structure and processes intended to prevent infection among residents and staff of long-term care facilities (LTCFs). The small volume of publications regarding cost of in...

An effective workforce performing within the context of a positive cultural environment is central to a healthcare organization's ability to achieve quality outcomes. The Nursing Culture Assessment Tool (NCAT) provides nurses with a valid and reliable tool that captures the general aspects of nursing culture. This study extends earlier work confirming the tool's construct validity and dimension...

This paper demonstrates that informal care by family members significantly weakens the demand for long-term care insurance. This result is largely driven by the fact that insurance does not cover informal care costs. To quantify the effect of informal care on insurance demand and evaluate potential welfare-improving policies, I develop and estimate a dynamic model of long-term care decisions be...

OBJECTIVES This paper addresses recent steps for reforming the eligibility criteria of the German long-term care insurance that have been initiated to overcome shortcomings in the current system. METHODS Based on findings of a survey of international long-term care systems, assessment tools and the relevant literature on care needs a new tool for determining eligibility in the German long-ter...

BACKGROUND The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) was introduced by the World Health Organization as a common taxonomy to describe the burden of health conditions. This study focuses on the development of a scale for staging basic mobility and walking functions based on the ICF. METHODS Thirty-three ICF codes were selected to test their fit to the Rasch m...

BACKGROUND The need for institutional long-term care is increasing as the population ages and the pool of informal care givers declines. Care services are often limited when funding is controlled publicly. Fees for Japanese institutional care are publicly fixed and supply is short, particularly in expensive metropolitan areas. Those insured by universal long-term care insurance (LTCI) are faced...

As at March 31, 2014, the regional health authorities (RHAs) administered 41 facilities with 2,788 long-term care beds available. Of these 41 facilities, 25 are publicly-operated long-term care facilities which provide residential care and accommodations to 2,390 long-term care residents who have high care needs and require on-site services. The remaining 398 long-term care residents are cared ...

OBJECTIVE To assess the effect of a 6-month interdisciplinary customized intervention based on goal attainment scaling and aimed at improving the quality of care provided by long-term care facilities to frail older adults. DESIGN A pair-matched group-randomized trial with quality of care measurements taken before and after the intervention and 6 months later. SETTING Forty unregulated small...

【Keywords】Informal care, Caregiver, Long-term care insurance, Labor supply, Japan 【JEL Classification Codes】J22, I11 【Abstract】This paper examines the labor supply outcomes of family care provision for Japanese households in 2010, ten years after the introduction of the public long-term care insurance (LTCI) program. We found that family care provision for parents adversely affected labor marke...