Annual Report 2012: Spain’s National Preventive Mechanism III.3. Social Health Care Centers The Ombudsman Institution has inspected many centers of this kind. In turn, inspections of these facilities were initiated as a new line of work for the NPM This type of center requires special protection and the work of the NPM is particularly important In 2011 55.288 involuntary admission proceedings were initiated 165. In 2012 the NPM initiated a new line of work with an inspection visit to a health care residence for the elderly and handicapped persons. The Ombudsman Institution wishes to continue and extend this line of work over the next few years. This was the first inspection visit carried out by the Ombudsman Institu­ tion as NPM, although since its foundation it has performed many inspection visits to this type of center, resulting in the following reports: «Public and Private Residences for Senior Citizens» (Residencias publicas y privadas de la tercera edad) (1990), «Legal and Healthcare Situation of the Mentally Ill in Spain» (Situa­ cion jurídica y asistencial del enfermo mental en España) (1991), «Residential Care for Persons with Disabilities and Other Related Aspects» (Atencion residencial a personas con discapacidad y otros aspectos conexos) (1996) and «Social Welfare Health Care in Spain: Gerontological Perspective and Other Related Aspects» (La atención sociosanitaria en España: perspectiva gerontologica y otros aspectos conexos) (2000). 166. Public residential healthcare centers provide healthcare, social and reha­ bilitation services, amongst others, to senior citizens, chronically ill patients and persons with physical, psychological, sensorial or intellectual disability who are in a situation of dependency and require supplementary support in order to ulti­ mately improve their quality of life. Given the situations in which the residents of these centers find themselves, they are more vulnerable, at times due to a situa­ tion of defenselessness or to their own incapacity to report situations of abuse. For this reason they require special protection and in this sense the work of the NPM is particularly important. According to the «Survey on Disabilities, Personal Autonomy and Situations of Dependency» (Encuesta sobre Discapacidades, Autonomia Personal y Situaciones de Dependencia) carried out in 2008 by the National Statistics Institute, 269,400 persons who declared they had some type of disability were in public or private institutions: health care residences (216,400 persons), centers for persons with a disability (36,000 persons) and long-term care hospitals (17,100 persons). Fur­ thermore, according to the information provided by the Spanish Office of the Attorney General, in 2011 a total of 55,288 involuntary admission proceedings were initiated, as shown in the following table. Table 45. Involuntary admission proceedings initiated in 2011 Regional Autonomous Communities Andalusia 130 N .º of proceedings 8,039 Aragon 501 Principality of Asturias 756 THE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN