Long-term care in Serbia

Abstract

The elements of long-term care in Serbia can be found within the systems of health care and social welfare and they generally comprise of rights to certain services and benefits. A part of the public policy dealing with long-term care needs implicitly relies on the support of families, i.e. different forms of informal help. Existing and projected demographic trends, social situation, as well as health conditions in elderly, require an integrative approach to long-term care and point to various challenges of the current concept. They equally refer to the accessibility and quality as well as financial sustainability of long-term care programmes and measures. The main problems rest within the spheres of inadequate coverage of elderly with institutional and out-of- institutional programmes, with disputed quality of certain measures and limited finances. Observed shortages of the current concept of long-term care in Serbia require the creation of direct connections among all stakeholders, along with adequate balancing between the public and private sectors, institutional and out-of-institutional programmes, cash benefits and in-kind benefits and services, Republic and local competencies.

Elementi dugotrajne zaštite starih u Srbiji nalaze se najvećim delom unutar sistema zdravstva i socijalne zaštite i uopšteno obuhvataju prava na određene naknade i usluge. Deo javne politike koji se odnosi na zadovoljavanje potreba za dugotrajnom zaštitom implicitno se oslanja na podršku porodice, odnosno na različite vidove neformalne pomoći. Postojeći i projektovani demografski trendovi, socijalna situacija, kao i zdravstveno stanje populacije starih, zahtevaju integrativan pristup dugotrajnoj zaštiti i upućuju na brojne izazove postojećeg koncepta. Oni se podjednako odnose na pristup i kvalitet, koliko i na finansijsku održivost programa i mera. Glavni problemi egzistiraju u sferi neadekvatnog obuhvata starih institucionalnim i vaninstitucionalnim programima, uz upitan kvalitet nekih mera i ograničene finansije. Uočeni nedostaci u postojećem konceptu dugotrajne zaštite starih u Srbiji upućuju na potrebu direktnijeg povezivanja svih aktera, uz adekvatnije balansiranje državnog i privatnog sistema, institucionalne i vaninstitucionalne podrške, materijalnih i nematerijalnih davanja i usluga, republičkih i lokalnih nadležnosti.