2009 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Study of End-of-Life Care Appropriate for Elderly Individuals in Long-Term Care Insurance Facilities

Research Project

Project/Area Number	19791752
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Research Field	Community health/Gerontological nurisng
Research Institution	Mie University
Principal Investigator	MAYUKO Hiramatsu Mie University, 医学部, 助教 (50402681)
Research Collaborator	OBUCHI Ritsuko 三重大学, 医学部, 教授 (80289975) KITAGAWA Akiko 三重大学, 医学部, 助教 (20422876)
Project Period (FY)	2007 – 2009
Keywords	高齢者 / 終末期ケア / 認知症グループホーム
Research Abstract	Living facilities for end-of-life care of elderly individuals are varying under the Nursing Care Insurance System. The quality of end-of-life care, therefore, is always questioned wherever the elderly choose to spend the rest of their lives. In this study, we focused on the level of awareness of nursing and care staff working in nursing care facilities (welfare and healthcare facilities for the elderly and group homes for the elderly with dementia in A prefecture) under the insurance system, which may have a significant influence on the appropriate end-of-life care for each elderly individual. We tried to understand the current situation of these facilities and identify the problems. As a practical approach to the problems, the experiences of nursing and care staff providing end-of-life care in the requested group homes for elderly persons with dementia were reviewed for cases of death, and the benefits from such experiences were evaluated.