Long-term care

This article includes inline citations, but they are not properly formatted. Please improve this article by correcting them. (June 2019) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Long-term care (LTC) is a variety of services which help meet both the medical and non-medical needs of people with a chronic illness or disability who cannot care for themselves for long periods. Long-term care is focused on individualized and coordinated services that promote independence, maximize patients' quality of life, and meet patients' needs over a period of time.^[1]

It is common for long-term care to provide custodial and non-skilled care, such as assisting with activities of daily living like dressing, feeding, using the bathroom, meal preparation, functional transfers and safe restroom use.^[2] Increasingly, long-term care involves providing a level of medical care that requires the expertise of skilled practitioners to address the multiple long-term conditions associated with older populations. Long-term care can be provided at home, in the community, in assisted living facilities or in nursing homes. Long-term care may be needed by people of any age, although it is a more common need for senior citizens.^[3]