ABSTRACT
During the last few years, “quality assurance” has become a catchword in Norwegian public care for the elderly and for people with disabilities. This catchword has emerged in a period with two central characteristics: a growing population of old people needing more care and nursing, and increasing financial constraints in the public sector. Statistics about the development in public home care and nursing services show that it has become more difficult to get such services in Norway during the past few years (Olsen, 1995). So if, as a first definition of improving quality, we think of giving the recipients more individual care - that is, taking the needs and wishes of the individual recipient more seriously - it looks like the possibilities for this are reduced. Thus, there are good reasons for not speaking of rising quality these days; and the catchword of “quality assurance” is thus in a way discordant with the general development in public home-based care services.
