Part I: Definition and financing of long-term care In 2011, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published an analysis of long-term care titled “Help Wanted? Providing and Paying for Long-Term Care”. The analysis focused on financing and availability of long-term care workers. This article presents selected information from this book and other sources.

Overview

The publication is based on data from “OECD Health Data” and “System of Health Accounts” databases and other sources. Information and data for the analysis, including on legislation and system of financing of long-term care, and priorities in this area, were provided by member states “ad hoc” through an extensive OECD questionnaire. “Systems of long-term care” as well as the definition and the boundaries between health and social components of long-term care are very diverse across OECD countries due to the differences in historical development of their health and social systems. This fact reduces the comparability of data on long-term care. Many OECD countries often provided incomplete information on some aspects of long-term, for example, only on institutional or home care component of long-term, for health or social part of the system. Data were often available also for different periods. The effort to apply common indicators and methodologies across countries in this diverse and rapidly changing field is naturally fraught with difficulties and limitations. Presented data and information should therefore serve for the basic orientation and comparisons between countries or groups of OECD countries.

Keywords:
OECD – long-term care – financing of long-term care