🇵🇹 Portugal Ageing, Long-Term Care & Community Support Knowledge Hub

Portugal is experiencing profound demographic change as population ageing increases demand for long-term care, community support and services that enable people to remain independent for longer. Its approach combines the National Health Service, social security and social-sector provision, the National Network for Integrated Continuous Care (Rede Nacional de Cuidados Continuados Integrados — RNCCI), home and community services, residential care, family caregiving and an important network of non-profit social solidarity organisations. The first collection within this Knowledge Hub explores Portugal Ageing, Long-Term Care & Community Support, with additional specialist collections being introduced as the library expands.

Portugal’s long-term care system is particularly important internationally because it sits across health, social protection, community provision and family support rather than within a single unified care system. The RNCCI was developed to strengthen integrated health and social care, rehabilitation, continuing care and support following acute illness, while other social responses include home support, day services and residential provision. Alongside formal services, families continue to make a substantial contribution to supporting older and dependent people. The interaction between these different forms of provision creates important questions about access, coordination, affordability, workforce capacity, assessment, continuity and accountability.

Although Portugal has its own institutional and social context, many of the pressures affecting its care system are shared internationally. These include population ageing, increasing levels of dependency and complex need, uneven access to formal long-term care, regional disparities, pressure on families, workforce recruitment and retention, sustainable financing, hospital discharge, greater demand for home and community-based support, dementia, social isolation, housing, digital transformation and the need to improve coordination between health and social services. Portugal therefore offers valuable learning for providers, commissioners, municipalities, government agencies, health organisations, social-sector organisations, researchers, policymakers and system leaders across different countries.

This Knowledge Hub has been created to examine the Portuguese approach to population ageing, long-term care governance, the RNCCI, social protection, financing, assessment and access, home support, residential care, family caregiving, informal carer policy, healthy ageing, prevention, dementia, community participation, workforce development, the social solidarity sector, health and social care integration, hospital discharge, rehabilitation, quality assurance, safeguarding, outcomes, housing, digital care, telecare and long-term system reform. It forms part of the interconnected international knowledge library across Impact Guru and Impact Insights Hub, supporting comparison between care systems and the practical application of international learning.

As the collection develops, articles will explore how Portugal’s long-term care system works; demographic ageing and future demand; the respective roles of national government, municipalities, health services, social security, families and providers; the National Network for Integrated Continuous Care; public funding and household costs; assessment and access; home and community support; residential care; regional inequality; workforce recruitment and professionalisation; public, private and non-profit provision; the role of Instituições Particulares de Solidariedade Social (IPSS); migrant care workers; family carers and the informal carer framework; dementia; loneliness and community connection; healthy ageing and prevention; health and social care integration; hospital discharge; quality regulation; safeguarding; outcomes; digital transformation; telecare and remote monitoring; financial sustainability and the future direction of Portuguese long-term care.

The aim is to build a practical, evidence-informed resource that explains how Portuguese policy, funding, health services, social protection, providers, professionals, families, communities, technology, governance and evidence interact. Rather than presenting Portugal as a model that can simply be transferred elsewhere, the Hub will identify where Portuguese experience provides useful lessons, where important system challenges remain and what international leaders can learn from the country’s continuing development of integrated, community-based and sustainable long-term care.

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