In Germany, Corresponding to the emphasis put on the informal, family-oriented care in Germany, social services in this area, at least up to the 1990s, failed to reach a professional status (Ostner, 1998). The replacement of nuns at the beginning of the 1970s with secular female employees had not led to the establishment of an independent, professional care service. Until the end of the 1980s, the local centres providing home care (Sozialstationen) usually hired casual labour with different educational attainment levels, often students, housewives and former nurses (Landenberger, 1994).