'Home care organizations are under increasing pressure to work harder and more efficiently than in the past. However, there is growing recognition that the resulting stresses and strains might jeopardize the widespread availability of high-quality home care services. It remains to be seen if an adequate balance can be attained in the next few years '.
5. EPILOGUE
Two subjects: nursing homes and transmural care.
Both subjects have a beating on the strains that the home care experiences.
Nursing homes are homes for people who cannot look after themselves, sometimes temporary, but in most cases people remain in a nursing home until they die. Although the number of beds in nursing homes has been growing in the last 20 years, the number of patients on a waiting list has grown faster.
Suppose our Mrs. Peterson would not have been able to look after herself the first few weeks or months after surgery. Because hospital care is only for specialized medical and nursing care, she would have had to leave the hospital and go to a nursing home for recovery. Here, another waiting list occurs.
Especially for psycho-geriatrics departments within the nursing homes the waiting lists are enormous and can amount to half a year. All the time the patient has to stay in the hospital.
For patients that should be admitted to a nursing home from the home situation, these waiting lists add to the existing strains on the home care. As long as these patients cannot be admitted to a nursing home, the home care organization has to look after them.
