Personal assistance for disabled people - the Norwegian experience

This article presents data from a survey of all disabled people in Norway who receive personal assistance in the municipalities that have been granted subsidies from the state. It concentrates on the following issues: Who are the users of personal assistance? What distinguishes them from other disabled people? What dimensions has personal assistance as a service? How has it influenced the total service to the recipients and how is this composed? How do the users value the service? To what extent does it seem to fulfil the aims of self-dependence and sovereignty for the users? The article concludes that personal assistance seems to be a suitable instrument to reach the goals of full participation and equality of status for disabled people in Norwegian society. The main challenges which personal assistance will meet in the future are the financing of the arrangement and how the principles of user-determination could be implemented and transferred to other services without losing its ideological base.