Turkish Journal of Geriatrics 2007 , Vol 10, Issue 2
LONG-TERM HOME CARE SERVICES AND CARE INSURANCE
Dokuz Eylül Üniversitesi Sağlık Hizmetleri Meslek Yüksek Okulu, İZMİR The ageing of the population, the increase of disability and chronic sickness caused the increase of demand for the health care services. The fact that portion of the health expenses in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) increased the demand of the need for care also caused new sources and methods to be searched for in terms of the cost. However, besides the financial problems, insufficiency of the present hospital beds, and that care services cannot be profitably provided, and the problems on quality assurance lead us to search for alternatives for institutional care services in plenty of various aspect come into being as the reason for preference.

Home care services are also the individual-centered care services, and they have a lot of advantages compared with institutional care services in terms of health expenditures and costs, and this proves why those care services are preferred by both individuals and governments.

Although need for care in societies, which happens due to aging, or some other reasons, is under the responsibility of the family many countries seeing recently that the family is being insufficient in meeting the basic care needs of the sick, disabled and elderly, and the family undergoes an increased burden, have been making efforts about developing low costing home care services systems and bringing forth a policy in order to provide overall balance of the role between the government and the family. Keywords : Long-term of home care services, Long-term care insurance, Elderly, Social security