[Strategies for the development of the quality of integrated home care]

Abstract

Home Health Care (HHC) is a strategy to provide holistic care for elderly, chronic and terminal patients and for patients early discharged from hospitals. The aim of this article is to give some advice to ensure social and health integration, coordination of procedures and family participation in HCC. Moreover a framework to ensure organization of a HHC service is required and a guideline to define functions and responsibilities, human and physical resources and procedures to deliver health care is provided. The first stage of a HHC project must be an educational programme for the multidisciplinary team involved in home care. The common education is the strategy to improve Quality of a HHC service, involving medical and social workers in the definition of their own "criteria and standards" for organization, resources and procedures.