Yokohama is part of the Kanagawa area where Social Welfare Corporation Shinkou Fukushikai (社会福祉法人 伸こう福祉会) has direct welfare-sector roots. The corporation operates elderly-care services under the Cross Heart name in the city, including in Sakae Ward (栄区).

The care itself runs on Japan's national long-term care insurance (kaigo hoken), the same system used across the country. What differs city to city is the first door you knock on. In Yokohama that door is the community comprehensive support center (地域包括支援センター).

These are not standalone offices. The city places them inside community care plazas (地域ケアプラザ) and a number of special nursing homes. The center that handles your case is fixed by the address where your parent lives. Look up the catchment center for that exact district rather than calling any center in the city.

Each center is staffed by professionals who handle the first assessment, explain the system and start a care-needs certification (要介護認定) application. Two further points are specific to Yokohama.

First, the hours are wider than most offices of this kind: roughly Monday to Saturday in the daytime, with shorter hours on Sundays and holidays. The city still asks you to phone ahead rather than walk in.

Second, the centers and the day-to-day services are spread across 18 wards. A family managing care from Sakae works with a different local center and a different set of nearby providers than one in Kohoku or Naka. Confirm the ward first, because everything downstream depends on it.

For a foreign family, the language gap usually appears at this first contact. Kanagawa Prefecture operates a foreign-resident consultation service covering many languages including English. It helps with orientation and translation, but it is not a care specialist. The actual care planning happens at the support center, and that conversation is usually in Japanese.

This is the gap JCC fills. We identify the correct ward-level support center for your parent's address, prepare you for the first consultation and translate what the care manager (ケアマネジャー) is proposing. Planning, preparation and family reporting can begin online. In-person support is assessed by location and scope.

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Official local references

Local specifics on this page are drawn from official sources:

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