"Inte mitt arbete...men det hänger på mig"
Hemtjänstpersonalens uppfattningar av sitt arbete i hemsjukvården
The proportion of elderly people in Sweden is increasing. Many of these live at home and as their age increases so does the likelihood of health problems and the need for support, medical attention and care. Personnel working with home help provide a large part of this care, including areas of home-based care that are the responsibility of the district nurse. The purpose of this paper is to describe how home-help personnel perceive their work in the area of home-based care, as their views are an important factor in the ability to provide a care system that funktions successfully. The method employed here is phenomenografic and nine subjects from a home-help group have been interviewed. The results show that the subjects do not perceive home-based care as being a part of their work, despite the responsibility that they take upon themselves by performing tasks that are intrinsically part of the work area home-based care. The results also show that they are competent in skills they are not permitted to use, and that the district nurse takes responsibility, is competent, and partakes in the home-based care, but from a distance. The conclusions that can be drawn here are that the home-help personnel?s work includes more aspects of home-based care than they themselves are aware of and that they draw upon themselves responsibility for certain elements of home-based care in the home because they are present during the provision of care whereas the district nurse is not.Keywords: Home-help service, home care, aged, phenomenography.