Due to rising life expectancies and declining birth rates, the volume and proportion of the elderly population in Korea is soaring at an unprecedented rate. In this context, social care for the elderly has emerged as an important issue in Korea; the ? ...
Due to rising life expectancies and declining birth rates, the volume and proportion of the elderly population in Korea is soaring at an unprecedented rate. In this context, social care for the elderly has emerged as an important issue in Korea; the ?long-term care insurance law for the elderly? came into effect in July 2008, bringing about drastic changes in elderly welfare services. As this insurance system focuses on in-kind benefits, like medical care, it is therefore of urgent need to establish an overall welfare infrastructure to provide proper service.
In countries with advanced welfare policies, elderly care has incurred a heavy financial burden on the society and efforts are made to cut back cost. As a result, facility care and medical services for the elderly which are more expensive?are managed to meet the minimum needs, while community-centered services?which are lower in cost?are promoted and reinforced. Also, elderly people prefer to receive attentive care for their health conditions in their local community rather than going away to a new facility in an unfamiliar place.
The U.K is one of the leading countries that has implemented social welfare systems early on and it has revised related laws since the beginning of the 20th century in order to improve its system. The country provides reliable elderly welfare services, with successful community care being a recent innovation. This research examines the architectural characteristics of community care facilities for the elderly in U.K, as well as its transition toward combining multiple social welfare facilities. The objective is to collect data to induce reasonable architecture planning and to provide future direction for elderly care services in Korea.
A primary characteristic of welfare services for the elderly in England is that it is encouraged to provide flexible and integrated community services based on their individual needs so that they can maintain independent lives in communities as possible. That is, England is making efforts to develop individual and diversified welfare programs and establish integrated service models that can comprehensively provide facilities care, domiciliary care and residence, income and health support services.
Although day care centers like the Age Concerns are facilities that provide a part of community care services, their roles as central facilities of community cares will be noted to grasp the community care services in England. The facilities will be divided into different types by community care service. To analyze the present state of supplies and planning characteristics of domiciliary care facilities in England, elderly person related systems such as insurance systems, care systems and welfare facility policies as well as characteristics that affect the environments of elderly persons? welfare such as population structures and cultures to take care of elderly persons had been reviewed from multiple angles. Through this review, the present state of community care services in England can be grasped more accurately and the results can be effectively applied to Korea where environments of elderly persons? welfare are different.
To grasp the types of various facilities and characteristics by type more clearly, it is necessary to visit representative facilities in person. Through this, data such as photos of interior/exterior of the facilities, drawings, building profiles, the present states of operation and management have been collected. Also, satisfaction with existing facilities by factor had been grasped or the present states of operation had been identified through interviews with or questionnaires on operators. Based on this, the results of the analyses have been made available for utilization in planning supplies or constructions of domiciliary care facilities.