Adult day programs provide nutritional, health, social, and recreational services for older adults during daytime hours. The heterogeneity of programs, participants, and funding sources creates challenges in defining and measuring participant outcomes of adult day services. There appear to be two main domains of influence that adult day programs can have on participants: physical health functioning and psychosocial well-being. The study of the psychosocial benefits of adult day services to participants has been neglected. The purpose of this article is to review current empirical literature and to propose a new conceptual model for examining the participant outcomes in adult day services programs, taking into consideration the variability in participant needs and program design and delivery. The model includes service elements that are related to psychosocial well-being and physical functioning, and these elements relate to specific physical and psychosocial proximal and distal outcomes. Further areas for research are suggested.

This study compares adult day services (ADS) and home health care (HHC) users on the indicators of personal characteristics, physical health, mental health and social network contacts. Analysis includes all 62 reported ADS users and a random sample of 91 HHC users from the Longitudinal Study of Aging. Results indicate that ADS users are younger, have greater cognitive impairment, need more supervisory assistance with activities of daily living (ADLs), and have more social contacts than HHC users. The findings also underscore the importance of emphasizing the functional and cognitive limitations in differentiating home- and community-based services. Instead of exclusively focusing on physical needs, authors suggest strategies that ensure integrated care models to address physical, mental and social needs of elders in both settings.

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The purpose of this study is to identify challenges to continual use of adult day services. Individuals who stayed in five adult day health care programs for four weeks or less are compared to those who stayed enrolled more than four weeks. Data were gathered from new intake files recorded January 1, 1999 to December 31, 2000 at five adult day programs operating in central Ohio. This study is based on 143 clients who disenrolled during this study period. Short stay participants were significantly different from long stay participants in race, educational level, mental health, and in financial and social resources. The findings support the important partnerships between informal and formal care resources in the utilization of adult day services and ultimately community-based living.

The adult day services (ADS) industry continues to grow and develop in providing care to larger numbers of older adults and their caregivers. Despite the growth in the number of programs and the changes in the way services are delivered, a systematic examination of the development of the ADS industry from a policy perspective has not been published since the mid-1990s. This article provides an analysis of the development of the ADS industry using the resource dependence model within a values-based context to determine whether public reimbursement opportunities are congruent with the needs of older adults and caregivers. Potential directions for the future development of the industry are presented through analysis of the collaborations of adult day providers with the providers of other services for older adults and the effort by public and private funders to connect quality outcomes and resources.