Abstract
In 1982 this research project was started with the aim to stimulate residents of residential care homes to take life in hand and thus provide them with more control over their environment. Research findings show that for residents increased control over their own environment leads to better health and a
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better quality of life. An intervention-instrument for empowerment was developed. Residents are induced to verbalize their opinion on the aspects of living in a residential care home that are relevant to them. The opinion is quantified in order to make it more influential with decision-makers. The collective opinion provides residents with a language for discussing their nursing home and for collectively raising consciousness and drawing conclusions. This enables residents' committees to improve the care in their home. The intervention was named “measure-and-discuss-intervention”. It became part of the benchmark for quality control in residential care homes in The Netherlands. The performance of residents' committees is described. There are problems in the relationship between residents and residents' committees, in the position of the residents' committees in homes and in the internal functioning of residents' committees. The description of problems and shortcomings entails suggestions for improvements. Residents’ opinion was measured in eleven residential care homes. The answers of the 240 respondents were reduced to seven subscales: personnel, belonging, comfort, residents' committee, food, friendship and freedom. These subscales enabled us to draw profiles of the eleven nursing homes. They also provided a basis for comparing groups of residents. Respondents with less cognitive ability differed little from the other residents. Mood cohered strongly with the total score and with the scales that have relational aspects: personnel, belonging, comfort, friendship and freedom. Comparing respondents for sociability and the number of personal contacts outside the home gave similar results. Respondents who came to live in the home without feeling forced to do so are on all scales much more positive in their opinion than others. Respondents' duration of stay showed little correlation with their opinion on their nursing home. We found no useful measure for the degree of fit between resident and nursing home. Respondents who chose their nursing home for its affiliation - religious or otherwise - did not differ from others. Nursing homes with more invalids among the residents are less appreciated on all aspects except residents' committee. Larger homes score relatively high on residents' committee and freedom; smaller homes score better on personnel, belonging, comfort, food and friendship.
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