Abstract
Objectives: The objective of this study was to perform an outcome evaluation focused on the long-term effects of care prevention programs for frail elderly by comparing frail elderly certified as requiring long-term care in a particular municipality.
Methods: The target population of this study was 1,936 frail elderly residents of Kitakyushu City, who were candidates for 4 types of care prevention programs in Fukuoka Prefecture during the fiscal year 2007. We examined whether the elderly residents qualified for a Certification of Needed Long-Term Care between April 2007 and March 2013. A Cox proportional hazards model was applied to calculate hazard ratios (HR).
Results: Overall, 53.3% of the residents in the participant group were certified as requiring long-term care, while this figure was 38.8% for the non-participant group. The non-participant group was not more likely to be certified as requiring long-term care than the participant group (HR: 0.74, 95% CI: 0.61–0.90).
Conclusions: Although the results revealed that participating in the care prevention programs did not work to prevent new cases of long-term care need, they provided suggestions about the methods of its detailed evaluation and indicated that programs need additional support after the program.
