Adult day centers: geriatric day health services in the community.

In the past decade, more attention has been devoted to community-based health care services for the impaired elderly. The adult day services center is one of the newer approaches to this kind of care. Adult day centers show a wide variety of services, staff, and settings, and these centers serve elderly patients with a wide variety of disabilities. Some day programs provide physical and psychosocial rehabilitative services; others offer longer term maintenance and supervision, social stimulation, and respite care. Many centers offer some combination of these services. For the family physician, this variation provides a range of health care choices and treatment options aimed at improving function and avoiding unnecessary or premature institutionalization of the elderly patient.