Goals of home care: Therapeutic, compensatory, either or both?

This article classifies home care goals into two broad categories: therapeu tic goals, in which home care providers strive for measurable improvement o n parameters of physical, psychological, or social functioning and compensa tory (or empowering) goals, in which home care providers strive to provide services to compensate for functional impairment, thus enabling consumers t o pursue their own goals. Therapeutic goals are loosely associated with "me dical models" of care and compensatory goals with "social models." From a c onsumer perspective therapeutic and compensatory goals are important, and a rtificial distinctions between the two should be eliminated. However, this merger should be effected in such a way that therapeutic approaches can be incorporated into programs with relatively low unit costs.