Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Difficult choices in treating and feeding the debilitated elderly
- 3 The American debate about artificial nutrition and hydration
- 4 Reflections on Horan and Boyle
- 5 The Living Will: the ethical framework of a recent Report
- 6 Some reflections on euthanasia in The Netherlands
- 7 Is there a policy for the elderly needing long-term care?
- 8 Is it possible to provide good quality long-term care without unfair discrimination?
- 9 The prospects for long-term care: current policy and realistic alternatives
- 10 What is required for good quality in long-term care of the elderly?
- 11 Should age make a difference in health care entitlement?
- 12 Economic devices and ethical pitfalls: quality of life, the distribution of resources and the needs of the elderly
- 13 The Aged: non-persons, human dignity and justice
- 14 Economics, justice and the value of life: concluding remarks
- Index
8 - Is it possible to provide good quality long-term care without unfair discrimination?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 October 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of contributors
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Difficult choices in treating and feeding the debilitated elderly
- 3 The American debate about artificial nutrition and hydration
- 4 Reflections on Horan and Boyle
- 5 The Living Will: the ethical framework of a recent Report
- 6 Some reflections on euthanasia in The Netherlands
- 7 Is there a policy for the elderly needing long-term care?
- 8 Is it possible to provide good quality long-term care without unfair discrimination?
- 9 The prospects for long-term care: current policy and realistic alternatives
- 10 What is required for good quality in long-term care of the elderly?
- 11 Should age make a difference in health care entitlement?
- 12 Economic devices and ethical pitfalls: quality of life, the distribution of resources and the needs of the elderly
- 13 The Aged: non-persons, human dignity and justice
- 14 Economics, justice and the value of life: concluding remarks
- Index
Summary
This paper describes some areas of difficulty which may occur in providing high quality long-stay care to everybody who needs it. Whether this is discrimination or not depends how broad a definition is given to this term.
Provision of resources
In order to provide high quality long-term care the first need is to have the proper facilities. This is not a matter which is under the control of doctors and is very much dependent on financial resources being made available by health authorities and boards and ultimately by the Government. A striking feature of health care is that very expensive high technology equipment is often readily available, and public appeals are sometimes used to provide this, but the technology of long-term care of elderly people, namely well designed and well staffed wards, is much less easy to obtain and does not excite the generosity of the public. When the distribution of wards within hospitals is decided, it is often the oldest and least attractive parts of the hospital that are allocated to those who are going to be in hospital longest, indeed, for whom hospital is going to be their home. The medical profession itself, and particularly that part of it which works in hospital, has a major responsibility for these attitudes.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Dependent Elderly , pp. 114 - 122Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992