Criterion for an Ideal Long-term Care System
One of the criteria for an ideal long-term care system concerns the requirement and capacity to coordinate diverse resources, including family, professional, consumer, and other informal caregiver resources in a community, to enhance the quality and effectiveness of care over time (Pratt, 2004). By its nature, long-term care demands the coordination and integration of roles and input from different points and resources in the healthcare system and the society to facilitate the effectiveness and value of care in addressing the needs of patients. Chronic conditions require coordinated and systematized care to ensure effective management and improved lives for patients (Burton, Anderson, & Kues, 2004). The integration of community, professional, family, and other informal caregiving efforts is vital to enable patients or consumers of healthcare to take full advantage of the system and benefit from effective management of their conditions (Pratt, 2004). The lack of such integration is likely to cause disruptions in the availability, flow, and quality of care services. This scenario is likely to undermine the abilities of patients with chronic conditions to take full advantage of healthcare services that are vital to manage these conditions in the long term.
This criterion is highly significant as a component of an ideal long-term care system since it relates to the prevalence and quality of a partnership between professional and non-professional resources to support the effective management of chronic conditions. The coordination and integration of diverse roles and input from different points and resources in the healthcare system and the society are vital to create and enhance a partnership among them to benefit the consumers of long-term care (Naylor et al., 2015). The involvement of families, professionals, consumers, and other informal caregivers in a long-term care model is vital to influence a well-coordinated and implemented plan of care and supportive services in clinical, social, home, community, and environmental settings. In this way, the long-term care patient is likely to benefit from the effective support of all stakeholders to facilitate an improved life and effective management of the chronic condition.
References
Burton, L., Anderson, G., & Kues, I. (2004). Using Electronic Health Records to help coordinate Care. The Milbank Quarterly 82(3): 457-481. Retrieved from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2690228/
Naylor, C., Imison, C., Addicott, R., Buck, D., Goodwin, N., Harrison, T., Ross, S., Sonola, L., Tian, Y., & Curry, N. (2015). Transforming Our Health Care System. The King’s Fund. Retrieved from: https://www.kingsfund.org.uk/sites/default/files/field/field_publication_file/10PrioritiesFinal2.pdf
Pratt, J. (2004). Long-term Care: Managing across the Continuum. Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett Learning