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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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| The changing balance of government and family in care for the elderly in Sweden and other European countries | | Author(s) | Gerdt Sundström, Lennarth Johansson |
| Journal title | Australasian Journal on Ageing, vol 24 Supplement, June 2005 |
| Publisher | Blackwell Publishing, June 2005 |
| Pages | pp S5-S11 |
| Source | http://www.cota.org.au / http://www.blackwellpublishingasia.com |
| Keywords | Family care ; Services ; Social policy ; Comparison ; Sweden ; Europe. |
| Annotation | Patterns of care for older people have changed markedly in Sweden in the post-war years, and new trends have emerged in the past decade. Relatively fewer older people are institutionalised or use public home help, and more are helped by family members. The family structure for older people in Sweden is more favourable today than before for providing help: more older people are married (or cohabit) and stay married longer, and more of them have children and other kin than previously. Although old parents and their offspring very seldom live together, they often do not live far apart. Social services increasingly target older people who are short on kin, very frail and live alone, a pattern that is common in European countries. Both carers and cared-for older people wanted shared responsibilities, that state and family together provide for frail older people. Paradoxically, more older people are cared for longer and more by their families, but eventually a large proportion of older people than before use public services. In particular, more older people now use institutional care for some period before the end of their life than previously. This paper draws on evidence across 50 years of shifting patterns in Swedish old age care, and makes comparisons with living arrangements and patterns of care in several European countries. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-050905206 A |
| Classmark | P6:SJ: I: TM2: 48: 76P: 74 |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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