[New opportunities for nursing in the future of intermediate care]

Intermediate care is an important focus of the Taiwan Government, domestic diagnosis groups, and the Ten-Year Long-Term Care Project. The objective of intermediate care is to bridge acute and long-term care in order to deliver more comprehensive healthcare to the population. It is an emerging healthcare service model. Intermediate care and a supportive environment should facilitate the functional recovery of patients and their successful return to the community. This article first describes the origins of intermediate care, its definitions and components, service models and related research. It then proposes the role of nursing in intermediate care and implications for nursing in the future of domestic intermediate care policy. We hope that academia, the government and health industry can work together to facilitate intermediate care in order to extend and expand nursing roles.