This master's thesis compares the working methods of social workers in public and private retirement homes. The theoretical part is divided into five parts and describes institutional care for the elderly, the social model and social work services in retirement homes as well as innovations in social care and elderly care in other European countries. The empirical part introduces the research problem and presents our research questions and methodology. With the help of a survey and a semi-structured interview, we collected data and social workers in retirement homes were used as our research unit. The study was carried out with non-probability convenience sampling. The results of our study and the discussion are presented below. More day-to-day cooperation between the residents and the employees as well as social workers, health workers and other employees can be observed in public retirement homes. The public retirement homes also offer more opportunities for an open dialogue with the social workers. Residents of public retirement homes have more freedom to decide how they want to live, as they can make their own decisions regarding their lifestyle, wheelchair seating, privacy, peace, diet and visits. On the other hand, private home residents have a greater say in selecting their diet, determining the place and time of their departures and deciding whether they want to leave the home or not. In some private retirement homes, they perform activities for residents that are not able to move and those in secured wards, and thus enabling them to participate in more activities. There are more public retirement homes than private ones that enable socialization outside the retirement homes, which means they are more open-minded and allow more interaction with the community. Private retirement homes use other methods to connect the residents with their relatives, like having conversation hours for the relatives and involving them in events, where they participate as performers. It can be concluded that, according to our findings above, the social model in the public retirement homes is better developed. In both types of homes, the social worker is in charge of receiving the residents and introducing them to their new home. Both private and public retirement homes are responsible for carrying out individual plans, participating in activities, cooperating with relatives and providing information to residents and relatives. Social workers in public retirement homes most often use the method of empowerment, while in private retirement homes individual planning is used. In both types of homes, all social workers work with the residents individually and in a group. The three homes have a fully developed palliative care with an oasis room. In all public homes a congruent relationship care is provided or, in other words, a culture a coordinated interpersonal relationship is cultivated. In all public retirement homes and in only one private home, day-care services are provided to external users. In both types of retirement homes, the order of payers of institutional care services is the same. Based on our findings, we suggest the following: residents should be more involved in the decision-making process by having an open dialogue in order to express their own wishes and needs to the employees; relatives should be more involved in the lives of the residents, for example, by participating in conversation hours for the relatives, which is already being carried out in one private retirement home; all services in the retirement homes should be involved in the residents’ activities; all residents, including those that are not able to move and residents with dementia in secured wards, should be included in all activities and innovations; residents and relatives should be encouraged to suggest more innovations, especially in private retirement homes, where the results have shown that relatives are only active in one retirement home; the falls prevention programs for the elderly could be implemented in more retirement homes to prevent injuries.
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