A study on determination of the needs of home care services

This study is a descriptive analysis of the need for home care services, home care needs of patients and their caregivers at home, and aims to identify difficulties they encounter.Sample of the study is held between the dates of April 1, 2011 and December 31, 2011 and consists applicants enrolled in a public hospital home health unit, 177 of them diagnosed with neurological diseases, and nearly 177 primary caregivers of these patients. The data is collected through a questionnaire prepared by the researcher through face to face interviews. Following research methods were used in the statistical analysis: The distribution of the number and percentage, mean distributions, Student's t test, variance analysis, correlation analysis, Man-Whitney U and Kruskall Wallis tests.63.8% of the patients included in the study were female, 59,3% were over 76, 60.5% were single, 49.2% were illiterate, 57.6% were housewives, 92.1% were insured through social securıty, 63.3% had a salary between 501-1000 TL and 58.8% were without any source of financial support, 74.6% had chronic disease, 72.9% had psycho-social problems, 2.8% were full care dependent, 91.5% were semi dependent, 5.6% were independent. 83.6% of caregivers were women, 52.5% were between 46-64, 79.1% were married, 47.5% were primary school graduates, 63.3% of them were housewives, 81,9% were insured with social securıty and 43.5% didn?t have proper monthly income. When the caregiver?s burden inventory was calculated, the results showed that the highest average is time dependence variable, and the lowest was emotional load variable. Caregiver burden inventory and the average sum points of the activities of daily living were calculated and the relationship between socio-demographic variables was analyzed. As a result, as the patient?s participation to ADL increased, the time dependency burden, developmental burden, and physical burden were decreased. There wasn?t any significant relationship between patients? total score of ADL and caregivers? total score of CBI (r = -0.041; p: 0.588, p> 0.05). This is explained by the fact that patient?s home care needs were met by family members and this being regarded as the normal path of care.According to the results of the study, the problems of both the patients and caregivers within the framework of home care services need to be identified; care and support systems should be established.Key words: Home care services, Home Health, Care Burden