Japan’s Long-Term Care Information System for Evidence (LIFE): Why It Is Established and What It Works Toward

Abstract

With its social security spending growing rapidly and the thinning home care workforce becoming a serious issue, the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare implemented LIFE, a long-term care information system, in 2021 with the aim of making in-home care services effective so as to promote self-reliance and prevent severe conditions from developing among older adults. LIFE, with a growing amount of data gathered from across the country on in-home care facilities and offices and service users and the status of their service receipt, is now able to provide evidence-based feedback information to providers and users alike. The Japanese government anticipates that the information system will help foster an encompassing virtuous cycle of less social security spending for the government, increased trust and work efficiency for providers, and enhanced quality of life and increased health life years (increased years of independent living) for older adults. The Japanese experience can have valuable implications for Korea.