["They are enjoying their first holiday ever"--working with the elderly, from the post-war years up to the early 1970s].

Abstract

While, in the post-war years and into the 1950s, the building of old people's and care homes and the allocation of home places in those homes was seen as the main task of municipal care institutions for the elderly in Frankfurt am Main, in the decade that followed their main task shifted towards increasing the possibilities of providing care in people's own homes, delaying the move into old people's homes and breaking through the loneliness that elderly people were presumed to experience. Supported by the state, community housing was provided with flats for elderly people and with carers to look after their needs. The "warm rooms" of the post-war period changed into clubs, where members met and received guidance. In the late 1960s the clubs were extended into day-care centres, offering a range of consultation services, organized day trips and recreational holidays for the elderly. It was hoped that "meals-on-wheels" in combination with age-appropriate living conditions would delay the move into a home. But these plans were not adequately developed in the 1960s and often it was not clear who would pay the bills. The same was true of outpatient medical care which had traditionally been the task of community nurses, but was now increasingly carried out by local authority carers, who also provided household assistance. This kind of care could only ever be given for a limited period of time and, while it was able to delay the move into an old people's home, it could not replace it.