The Nation - News from Aug. 31, 1987

Three out of five people entering nursing homes are put there not for medical reasons but because their families no longer have the energy or resources to care for them, a government study concluded. The primary medical reasons given for institutionalization were also more of a disruptive nature--such as Alzheimer’s disease--rather than illnesses requiring sophisticated medical attention, concluded a survey of next of kin conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics in Chicago. But the researchers who compiled the government data said they thought the children of older people should not be criticized for abandoning their parents, since many of the care givers are elderly themselves.