Objective Aging process in China has brought more and more challenges to traditional home-based care for the aged and more attentions to the mode of institution-oriented elderly care.This work,by analyzing the problems and defects of institution engaging in elderly care based on the human factors engineering theory,discusses the people-centered institution-oriented elderly care service system,in terms of the problems that the pattern of in-stitution-oriented elderly care focuses more on the facilities and environment construction than the principal role of people in the elderly care service system.Methods Sampled the institutions engaging in elderly care in Hefei City,Anhui Province,P.R.China (a medium-sized city in China) ;surveyed 45 institutions engaging in elderly care and 828 registered elders in Hefei City by hierarchical and systematic sampling method.Results (1) institutions engag-ing in elderly care shared the occupancy rate of 49.6％ and low total service efficiency;(2) institutions engaging in elderly care offered 100％ life-oriented service items,but only 6.1％ personalized service items provided;(3)100％ simple housing facilities in elderly care institutions,but extremely less personalized service facility (3.2％),with poorer quality and less satisfaction;(4) insufficient professional service staff could be available;48.1％ institu-tions have 5 or less professional service staffs.Conclusion A countermeasure to improve the elderly care service sys-tem was raised here by aiming at improving the institution-oriented elderly care service:(1) to transfer service to-ward the people-oriented concept,formulating preferential policy for endowment insurance;(2) to pay attention to personalized design of service facility,offer personalized and featured service items,and improve service management level;(3) to build professional team for elderly care.