The assessment of a hospital-based care management model for long-term care services

The purpose of this research was to assess the effectiveness of a hospital-based care management model on disabled elderly people. A before-and-after quasi-experimental design was adopted. A total of 331 disabled elderly people, residing in the Da-An District of Taipei City, participated in the study. Among them, 166 received care management, while the other 165 did not. The latter served as controls. Baseline and follow-up data collection were carried out before and after care management intervention. Logistic regression analysis was used to test the effects of care management on medical care expenditure, self-rated health, and satisfaction with long-term care arrangement. The results showed that those under care management, compared to the controls, were more likely to experience a decrease in medical care expenditure, and less likely to have a decrease in satisfaction with long-term care. The effects were statistically significant. However, there was no effect on self-rated health. The findings show that hospital-based care management is a viable option and has the potential to become an important segment in the delivery of long-term care services. More effort should be expended in its development and in the evaluation of its effectiveness.