Daycare for elderly people in Sweden: a national survey

This study describes the current provision of daycare for elderly people in Sweden. Daycare offers an interesting and relatively unknown field for investigation. It is necessary to provide a comprehensive picture of the provision of daycare, i.e. number of daycare centres, personnel and economic resources. In spring 1995 a survey was carried out in a representative sample of 70 Swedish municipalities. A questionnaire was sent to all 376 identified daycare centres in the participating municipalities and 312 responded. The results show that daycare may be categorized into two main groups and five types, according to the aims, locations and activities offered at the centre. Converting the findings from the survey into national estimates, there are approximately 1500 daycare units serving about 45,000 pensioners on a regular basis, at an annual cost of 500 million SEK.