Long term care entails several facilities and services required in meeting ordinary and medical needs of the people suffering from disabilities, chronic illness or old age. The idea behind this concept is that old populations cannot take care of themselves for long.
Long-term care can be divided into two major categories; normal daily tasks or custodial tasks and skilled cares. Custodial tasks include assistance in regular routine activities such as dressing, using bathroom, bathing, eating and getting around. However, skilled cares need specific expertise in providing medical care to the older populations during chronic conditions and health problems. Though it could be the need of people of any age, it is a common requirement of senior citizens at homes, in assisted living centers, nursing homes or medical care centers.
The need for long-term care facilities was felt when the younger generation could not take care of both their children as well as their parents. The reason is that parents need more care in old age than the children do. Furthermore, sometime some chronic illness of seniors requires a permanent attendant that is difficult to arrange without going for nursing homes. Increasing older populations has given birth to the idea of long-term care and long term facilities so that older generation should not suffer due to preoccupations of the younger generation and maintain their lives with dignity, pleasure and happiness.