Ministry of Health and Welfare's 2013 "Evaluation of Services in Local Health Agencies" ranked Hsinchu County the first in Taiwan for the long-term care services. Hsinchu County also won Award of Excellence in the promotion of services. Yin Dong-cheng, the director of Department of Health, gave the Award to Chiu, Hsinchu County Magistrate, on September 9. Magistrate Chiu complimented the achievement and indicated that Hsinchu County has been promoting a more senior-citizen-friendly city for a long time in terms of all the aspects in life from food, clothing, housing, transportation, education, to entertainment in order to provide the best quality of long-term care services, establish a comprehensive care system, and take care of senior citizens.
According to Magistrate Chiu, owing to the aging society, many elderly are left alone without good care from their families. By establishing the resource network, all kinds of long-term care services has been implemented gradually since Magistrate Chiu took office. These services include day care centers, buses for the physically challenged, shuttle buses for transport to medical care, taxi service for seniors, food delivery for people in disadvantaged groups and solitary elderly, the installation of emergency reporting system, etc.
From 2010 to 2014, Hsinchu County Government has invested NT$328.88 million in developing long-term services such as home care service, day care, transportation, purchase and rental for assistive devices, improvement of accessible environment, food provision, and subsidies to nursing homes. Benefited families, consequently, has grown from 500 in 2010 to 1200 in 2014.
Besides the improvement in long-term care services and the establishment of 43 community care centers, three more services have been provided for dementia elderly in recent years. These include shuttle bus service for the elderly, assistive devices rental, and the creation of accessible environment. In terms of day care, there have been day care centers established in Zhubei, Hengshan, Baoshan and Xinpu since 2010. In addition, Zhubei Sunflower Dementia Day Care Center has also been founded. Aboriginal regions including Taoshan, Garden in Wufeng, and Meihua in Jianshi now have their own day care centers as well. As more day care centers are under construction and planned, the network of the day care centers in Hsinchu County is expected to be completed by the end of 2017.
Source: Department of Health, Hsinchu County Government, Social Affairs Department
Writer: Fang Hui-ru