Nursing home data: missing

As stated elsewhere on the website, Aged Care Crisis calls for meaningful data to be made available about the aged-care homes where many older Australians live. The community has been promised greater transparency in all spheres of government but there is little evidence of this within the aged-care sector. 

Aged-care providers receive billions of dollars of taxpayer funding; it should not be too much to ask for full disclosure as to how that money is being spent.  As well as increased transparency, such disclosure may well encourage improvement in residential aged-care services.

Here are some things that people don’t know when they are trying to locate a suitable aged-care home:

• What are staff/resident ratios?
• Do residents get permanent assignment of staff?
• Is a registered nurse always available on-site?
• What is the number and nature of substantiated complaints levelled against the facility?
• How have the complaints been resolved?
• If a bond payment is required, would it be a $50,000 bond or a $500,000 bond, for example?
• Does a dietician plan menus for residents who require special diets?
• How are residents and families involved in treatment / care plans?
• Are resident support groups encouraged - and run independently by family members?
• What is the availability of health professionals
  (eg doctors, dentists, podiatrists, speech therapists, etc)?

2009 Reviews: Complaints and Accreditation

Aged Care Crisis has made submissions to the two Reviews into Complaints and Accreditation.

The Department of Health and Ageing has chosen not to publish submissions received from both the Complaints and Accreditation reviews transparently on its website.

25 July 2009: Complaints Investigation Scheme Review

The Australian Government engaged Associate Professor Merrilyn Walton to conduct a review of the operation of the Aged Care Complaints Investigation Scheme.

The review received 119 submissions from a range of different groups. Professor Walton also met with a wide number of stakeholders personally as part of that process.

The Complaints Investigation Report by Professor Walton report was withheld for nearly seven months prior to being made public.

27 May 2009: Review of residential aged care accreditation process

The Department of Health and Ageing (DOHA) conducted another review of the accreditation process for residential aged-care homes. DOHA received 147 submissions from a range of different groups.

Related: New Review short on detail

Just show us the data!

In an analysis the Aged Care Crisis Centre found that between 10 and 22% of the visits made by the accreditation agency are reported depending on when the three yearly expected audits come up.  Only 5% of the information gathered from nursing homes by both DOHA and the agency is reported publicly.

2007-2008: For example, Of the nearly 8,500 visits and/or reports made to a little under 3,000 nursing homes by the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency (Agency) and by the Department of Health and Ageing in the 2007-2008 year, only the 517 accreditation reports are publicly available.

2009-2010: Of the nearly 10,800 visits made to nearly 3,000* nursing homes by the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency and by the Department of Health and Ageing in the 2008-2009 year, approximately 1,700 accreditation reports are