Care of an aging parent is the topic of Norma Field's book, From My Grandmother's Bedside, Sketches of Postwar Tokyo . She continued to spend summers there. I also say the same. I say, I cannot do for my mother what she is doing for hers, and I wouldn't expect it of my daughter. Field's own mother had been caring for her mother for three and a half years in the home the two shared at the time the book was written.
Field observes that home care is doubtless the most desirable living situation for the elderly ill.
She notes that in Japan there are supportive services which are unavailable in the United States including home visits by beauticians and dentists, as well as affordable rental equipment, all supported by the national health insurance system. A neighborhood doctor makes house calls twice a month, changing Obaachama's nasal feeding tube and drawing blood. He gives Field's mother a computer printout of Obaachama's test results. A minitruck comes to the home weekly, providing a quickly assembled bathtub. A clinic nurse also makes weekly visits.