Clinical and research challenges of intermediate care

Health care systems of today did not evolve to provide optimum care to an ageing population. The philosophies that shaped the United Kingdom's (UK's) response to disease drew on the perceived health care needs in the 19th and early 20th century, and were crystalised into the formation of the UK National Health Service (NHS) in the mid-20th century. In those days, life was reletavely brutish and often quite short, illness was acute, severe and potentially life threatening.