Kontakt 2011, 13(3):308-314 | DOI: 10.32725/kont.2011.036

New consideration of the degree of dependence based on principles of the International classification of functional capacity, disability and healthHealth and Social Sciences - Review

Rostislav Čevela^*, Libuše Čeledová

Ministerstvo práce a sociálních věcí ČR, odbor lékařské posudkové služby

The consideration of the degree of dependence for purposes of providing financial contributions to the care is currently being performed through the mediation of the assessment of the impact of long-term adverse conditions on the ability to manage operations delimited by the law. In the currently existing system, based on section 9 paragraphs 1 and 2 of Law No. 108/2006 Sb. "On social services" as amended, the ability to manage 18 operations in taking the self-care and 18 self-sufficiency activities are evaluated. Each of these operations includes a number of activities as delimited in Attachment l of Regulation No. 505/2006 Sb. as amended. The result of this is that within the framework of these particular 36 operations, total of 129 activities are evaluated: 71 activities in taking the self-care and 58 activities concerning the self-sufficiency. The principle of the proposed changes in considering the health condition of applicants for the financial contribution to the health care is an assessment of the degree of dependence based on the transformation of the existing 36 operations in 10 integral and logically associated spheres of the everyday life specifying how the applicant manages fulfilling of basic needs of the life. In general, the 10 basic spheres of the life needs include all the still considered operations. The new second-opinion medical criteria are based on the evaluation of everyday life activities, which have already been shown to be useful in practice and which are simultaneously the first step to accepting the International classification of functional capability, disability and health (ICF) by the professional public. Thus, by the incorporation of elements of the ICF, comprising all the components of the human health and certain components of the well-being, into the new second-opinion medical criteria of the assessment of the degree of the dependence, the attitude of the professional public to health handicaps is being modified. The suggested change in considering the degree of the dependence by second-opinion physicians simultaneously offers a continuation of changes in the new approach to the determination of the dependence of the persons subjected to the opinion, initiated in January 2011 by a new concept of the social examination.

Keywords: consideration of dependence degree; law on social services; ICF; ADL

Received: July 3, 2011; Accepted: September 5, 2011; Published: September 29, 2011  Show citation