Outcomes and Challenges of Community Care Conferences as Perceived by Care Managers

Outcomes and Challenges of Community Care Conferences as Perceived by Care Managers

This study aimed to clarify the outcomes and challenges of community care conferences from the perspective of care managers, who play a central role in community-based integrated care systems. A self-administered anonymous questionnaire survey was conducted among care managers in A Prefecture who had experience participating in community care conferences focused on individual cases, yielding 155 valid responses.
The results indicated that community care conferences functioned as opportunities to review care management processes and to deepen understanding of other professionals’ roles. However, participants reported limited perceived effects on service users and their families, as well as limited impacts on motivation for continued participation and job retention. Furthermore, the quality of conference facilitation and the nature of interdisciplinary collaboration were found to be associated with care managers’ evaluations of community general support centers.
These findings suggest that community care conferences should be redefined and reconstructed not as one-time discussion forums, but as continuous support processes encompassing pre-conference, conference, and post-conference phases. In particular, it is important to clarify the responsibility of community general support centers in providing post-conference follow-up and practical support, in order to ensure that agreed care plans are effectively translated into practice.