[The relevance of health status for nursing home admission of elderly patients].

The article is based on a longitudinal study examining the risk of institutionalization in old age, especially with reference to the health status. According to the results, chronic disease only in interaction with old age has a significant impact on institutionalization. Other interactions for example between health status and housing conditions or between health status and marital status were not found. However, the age impact on institutionalization is not fully explained by other factors such as health condition. Altogether, healthy elderly people become institutionalized less often and later than elderly people who are either chronically ill or physically disabled or handicapped.