Why Acute-Care Hospitals Must Undertake Long-Term Care

FROM 1970 to 1980 the elderly population (those over age 65) grew by 14.8 per cent in Massachusetts and by 27.3 per cent in the country as a whole. The population over the age of 85 — 22 per cent of whom are institutionalized in the United States — grew by 53 per cent in the state and by 48 per cent in the United States.1 This "graying of America" promises to continue (Table 1) and will radically change the future patient mix in acute-care hospitals. By 1978 the elderly accounted for more than 48 per cent of patient-days in . . .