生活化、福利化及社區化的長期照護制度之設計為福利國家發展的趨勢；而滿足國民之長期照護需求，必須以跨部門與跨專業整合為基礎才能奏效。在各種長期照護專業服務體系中，社會工作人員扮演著重要的角色，但甚少文章深入剖析其主要的功能與角色扮演，本文主要目的乃利用文獻探討方式由角色理論回顧，進而深入了解社會工作人員在長期照護體系所扮演的角色與定位，以及在不同領域中社會工作人員的角色壓力與工作發展等，藉此釐清他們與在長期照護體系中與其他專業人員的異同。

Livable, welfare and community oriented long term care services are the trend of Welfare State development. To ensure the satisfaction of the long term care users, multidisciplinary and mutlisectoral approaches are the vital ways to reach the objectives. Social worker is one of the vital members of the service professionals in the long term care services. However, there is little information to describe and analyze the roles and functions of social workers in the long term care services. The main aims of the present paper are to examine the roles and functions of social workers in the long term care services based the current literature reviews. To begin with the reviewing of role theories, and then to analyze the roles and functions of social workers in different long term care settings. Furthermore, the role stress, role development and different characteristics of social workers comparing with other professionals in the long term care services will be discussed in the present paper.