'A Nursing Facility Like Home'... Recruiting Institutions for Unit Care Phase 2 Pilot Project Participation

The Ministry of Health and Welfare announced on the 16th that it will recruit about 20 institutions to participate in the second pilot project of 'Unit Care,' an elderly care service that principles single-occupancy rooms.

This project is being promoted to provide high-quality care by converting nursing facility infrastructure from mainly multi-occupancy rooms to mainly single rooms and by additionally deploying care personnel, so that nursing facilities with communal living can respond to new care needs such as autonomy and privacy protection.

A 'unit(residential unit within the facility)' consists of nine residents as one residential and care management unit. In principle, it must have nine single rooms of at least 10.65㎡ each, a common living room of at least 2㎡ per resident, and at least one restroom and bathroom. All care workers working in the unit must complete dementia-specialized training and work full-time, and each unit installed in elderly care facilities must assign a leader-level care worker with more than three years of long-term care claim experience to each individual unit.

Since starting the Unit Care pilot project in July last year, the Ministry of Health and Welfare currently operates a total of 11 units in seven facilities in Gyeonggi, Chungbuk, Jeonbuk, and Jeonnam. To expand the Unit Care model, about 20 units will be selected from elderly medical welfare facilities designated as long-term care institutions for this second pilot project.

Applications for participation in the pilot project will be accepted from the 7th to the 23rd of next month, and after review by the selection committee, the final selection and announcement will be made on June 25. Detailed information can be found on the websites of the Ministry of Health and Welfare and the National Health Insurance Service's Long-Term Care Insurance for the Elderly.

Im Eum-gi, Director of Elderly Policy at the Ministry of Health and Welfare, said, "Since long-term care facilities are places where the elderly spend the rest of their lives after admission, it is important to provide an environment like their own home," adding, "Through the Unit Care pilot project, we will create a new model where the elderly can live comfortably."