Keeping rehabilitation at home close: is it too close or not close enough

The everyday lives of people with multiple chronic conditions can be challenging, in terms of not only their diseases but also their ability to cope and navigate in their altered everyday lives. Some are therefore applying for or already receiving home care. For the past ten to fifteen years there have been an increased focus in health policy internationally on rehabilitation at home, where people with home care needs are increasingly being offered rehabilitation at home programmes in addition to home care. In Denmark, rehabilitation at home has now taken on a new form following the Consolidation Act on Social Services, in which rehabilitation at home programmes are now closely linked and explicitly described as aimed at reducing or completely replacing the home care that people receive or apply for.
Based on data from 17 months of ethnographic fieldwork from October 2016 to February 2018, where I as part of my PhD followed 26 people with multiple chronic conditions in their everyday lives and in their encounter with rehabilitation at home programmes, I will show how rehabilitation at home creates vulnerability for some people in their everyday life with chronic conditions, while others perceive rehabilitation as supporting their everyday life. Furthermore, I will discuss the implications of keeping rehabilitation at home close – a closeness which increases inequality in people’s access to health.