Professional recommendations for long-term care placement: a comparison of two groups of institutionally vulnerable elderly.

This paper investigates client and service characteristics that differentiate placement recommendations in two groups of elderly who are vulnerable to institutionalization--community residents who have applied for nursing homes and acute care patients who were viewed as likely candidates for long term care facilities. The two groups differ considerably on measures of physical and mental well-being as well as service need and availability. The community applicants were in poorer overall condition except with respect to medical requirements. A separate discriminant analysis of placement recommendations (long term care institution versus community) was carried out for each group using the client and service need characteristics as the discriminating factors. The results suggested that some factors such as family care and ADL skills and requirements are important predictors of placement recommendations in both groups, but there were also a number of unique elements in each function. The authors stress the importance of population differences in institutional decisions.