[The present state of the visiting nurse support system of our hospital]

In our hospital, a Visiting Care Service System was started in 1985, and now we have four nurses and one public health nurse. In the first half of 1996, we visited 116 patients. Their average age was 79.5 years-old, and most of them were almost bedridden all day. In 63.8% of these cases, the underlying disease was cerebrovascular. Frequency of visits was once a week in 45.7%, but in the terminal state we visited more frequently almost all days. In 79.3% of these cases, the duration of this service was less than three years, but in a few cases more than 10 years. Some patients were given the following medical care: gastrostomy (39.7%), care of bed sores (29.3%), necessity of suction of sputa (26.7%), urinary drainage tube (13.0%), tracheostomy, home oxygen therapy, home parenteral nutrition therapy, bile drainage tube insertion and so on. Persons providing care were mostly female (87.8%), and most of them were 40 to 60-year-old women. It is important to create a suitable support system to continue treatment at home.