A wide-range of respite services have been developed to meet the needs of families who care for the chronically ill and frail elderly. Institutional respite is a particular service that provides inpatient care to patients and offers their families temporary relief from the strain of continuous caregiving. This paper describes a two-week in-hospital respite program specifically designed for patients with Alzheimer's disease. Patients are profiled on the use of respite, sociodemographic characteristics, functional levels, and their dispositional outcome following respite.
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