Structure Healthcare Standards and Criteria That Contribute to the Care of Residents in Homes for the Elderly: A Narrative Review

Abstract

Meaningful life for the residents is mostly influenced by the context of the homes for the elderly. Context in terms of structure healthcare standards should recognize protection needs of residents as their rights to safety. The review aimed to identify structure healthcare standards and criteria that contribute to the care of residents in homes for the elderly. The literature reviewed included theoretical and empirical literature. Peer-reviewed scientific journals based on the structure standards in healthcare that contribute to the care of residents in homes for the elderly were obtained from three databases (Google scholar, PubMed, HINARI). Key words search of these databases were used. One hundred twenty-eight studies (n = 128) on healthcare standards were identified. Latter analysis was followed to analyze the studies whereby researchers merged findings of single and independent studies. Seven main themes emerged from the analysis namely infrastructure, clinical management, meals and water, residents’ rights, guiding documents for the care of residents, human resources required, and safety and security. Homes for the elderly should involve the elderly in their care to promote ownership of their services. In addition, the homes must improve the physical set-up to balance residents’ needs and protecting them from physical and psychological maltreatment.

Keywords:

• Elderly
• healthcare
• homes for the elderly
• residents
• structure standards

Acknowledgments

I would like to express my gratitude to my supervisor Professor E. L. Stellenberg and co-supervisor, Dr. M. Van Der Heever and my biostatistician, Ms. Tonya Esterhuizen who guided me throughout this project.

I would like to thank the Ministry of Social Welfare Health, Community Development, Gender, Elderly and Children (MoHCDEC) (Tanzania) for their support.

I wish to extend my special thanks to managers and staff in homes for the elderly in Tanzania for their support during data collection.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

No funding or grant was received for conducting this study.