Long-term care is a major site for people who have severe chronic conditions and are close to death. However, most people do not enter long-term care sites willing to receive end-of-life care, and many older persons stay at home to receive their long-term care (Sussman et al., 2019). According to Pratt (2015), the greatest need in our long-term care system is operating in a highly efficient and cost-effective manner. The reason for that is the character of third-party payers that has become much more restrictive when it comes to the costs they are willing to pay (Pratt, 2015). Our long-term care system is associated with both benefits and challenges that are revealed to any recipient of long-term care. The most significant advantage of our long-term care system is that it is now involved in substantial healthcare networks, meaning that people can now choose from a wider variety of healthcare providers (Pratt, 2015). However, healthcare providers nowadays have to care about their financials, costs associated with their work, advertising, reimbursement, and other similar things (Pratt, 2015). Thus, people can meet unqualified commercial healthcare providers in the long-term care system.
The ideal long-term care continuum is difficult to describe as many significant elements should be addressed. However, some specificities can be discussed to define the long-term care continuum as an ideal one. According to Sussman et al. (2019), long-term care services are mainly required when a patient has some ongoing disabilities, including both cognitive and physical impairments and loss of functions related to daily living. Therefore, the ideal continuum of long-term care, or the one close to perfection, is created when the patient (or patients) are provided with everything they need to address their current condition comfortably.
References
Pratt, J. R. (2015). Long-term care managing across the continuum. Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Sussman, T., Kaasalainen, S., Lee, E., Akhtar-Danesh, N., Strachan, P. H., Brazil, K.,… & Young, L. (2019). Condition-specific pamphlets to improve end-of-life communication in long-term care: staff perceptions on usability and use. Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 20(3), 262-267.