Month: January 2020

Originally published by Anita Courtney, Solomon Miller and Dr Melanie Tan.

In 2018, Russell Kennedy published an article about the challenges for aged care providers when offering self-management models to home care clients. Since then self-management models have continued to become increasingly common and the new standardised Pricing Schedule has an option for self-management.

Consumer groups have welcomed the shift towards self-management. In 2019, COTA Australia, in conjunction with RMIT University, completed their ‘Increasing Self-management in Home Care’ project. This project, which looked at the experiences of 7 home care providers has resulted in COTA developing a suite of resources to inform providers and consumers what “self-management” means and how it can operate in practice.

Read more:

Considering offering a self-management option in home care? Key considerations for aged care providers moving into the home care space

COTA – Self-management Resources and Tools

A new online form is available on the My Aged Care website that allows consumers or someone acting on their behalf to:

• register with My Aged Care
• apply for their first assessment online.
• The form can be completed in their own time as an alternative to calling the My Aged Care contact centre.

Visit the My Aged Care website for information about how consumers can now apply for an assessment.

This new functionality will be continuously improved.

Read more:

Consumers can now apply for an aged care assessment online

Apply for an assessment

Make a Referral

All current aged care website content will move to the department’s new site – health.gov.au – late on 22 January 2020. The new aged care content is directed at our workforce, including assessors, providers and health professionals. My Aged Care remains our primary source of information for consumers.

Health’s new website launched in July 2019, following a comprehensive engagement process with stakeholders. Transitioning aged care content to health.gov.au will improve the experience of all users through:

• more intuitive navigation
• a comprehensive search function
• content written in plain English
• better analytics to help us understand users and continue to respond to their needs.

Read more:

Transition of the department’s aged care web content

https://www.health.gov.au/

https://www.myagedcare.gov.au/

The Morrison Government’s $185 million Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission has taken another positive step forward today, with the release of the draft Roadmap for public consultation.

The consultation will present the Australian public with an opportunity to assess the draft Roadmap, and offer feedback on the current strategy.

It will ultimately assist the Government as it seeks to prioritise funding for critical dementia and aged care research.

Minister for Health, Greg Hunt, described dementia as “one of Australia and the world’s greatest health challenges,” but said it was a challenge the Morrison Government was “deeply committed to.”

“Greater research into dementia is vital, but it’s important to ensure the research is targeted to have the greatest impact” Minister Hunt said.

Read more:

Dementia, Ageing and Aged Care Mission Roadmap released for public consultation

DRAFT Roadmap – Dementia Ageing and Aged Care Mission (.pdf)

The draft Roadmap is available for comment at: https://consultations.health.gov.au

The Manad Plus Help Desk will be OPEN on Australia Day.

• Monday 27th January 2020

Note: The Management Advantage office will be closed.

The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission handles a range of complaints every day. Some of these complaint issues can be handled solely by us, while others may need to be referred to another organisation. We work closely with a number of organisations to ensure that your concerns are handled correctly, by the people best placed to deal with them.

There are five organisations we refer complaint information to when required:

1. Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency
2. Coroner
3. Department of Health
4. Police
5. Health Complaints Entities

Read more:

Referrals to other organisations fact sheet (.pdf)

Watch this short video to hear Hazel Hawke’s daughter, Sue Pieters-Hawke, talk about the effect that reducing her mother’s medication had on her quality of life.

Sue and others are speaking in support of the Reducing Use of Sedatives (RedUSe) program. This was a Government funded initiative, developed and trialled initially in Tasmania in 2008, and expanded nationally from 2014 – 2016.

It promotes quality and appropriate use of sedatives, in particular antipsychotics and benzodiazepines, in residential aged care services in Australia, and assists with reducing use of these medications whenever possible.

The Commission, with Dr Juanita Breen who developed the program with the Wicking Institute and University of Tasmania, has now trained a small cohort of well credentialled and experienced pharmacists to implement RedUSe. These pharmacists will begin visiting aged care services in remote and very remote locations early in 2020 to offer training and support in reducing the use of sedatives in their services.

Watch:

Reducing the use of sedatives – video

An effective approach to decrease antipsychotic and benzodiazepine use in nursing homes: the RedUSe project (.pdf)

The RedUSe Executive Summary (.pdf)

On 1 January 2020, the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission (the Commission) became responsible for approval of providers, aged care compliance and compulsory reporting which were previously the responsibility of the Secretary of the Department of Health. This includes monitoring of Prudential Standards. This transfer of statutory responsibilities from the Department provides the Commission with a broader range of regulatory functions and powers to oversee the provision of care by providers of Commonwealth-funded aged care services.

The Commission has prepared a summary of Key Changes to Commission Rules. Amendments to the Commission Rules were implemented in late 2019 to support the transition of regulatory functions.

The amendments focus on the following key outcomes:

• integrate and remove duplication in the management of non-compliance with the Aged Care Quality Standards (Quality Standards)
• establish a regulatory framework with graduated and escalating responses to non-compliance
• streamline existing performance assessment processes, providing greater clarity to consumers and transparency of decision making for providers.

The Commission has also updated key information in the following Regulatory bulletins:

• Assessment contacts in residential and home services
• Non-compliance with the Aged Care Quality Standards
• Aged Care Quality Standards performance assessment methodology
• Regulatory decision making

Read more:

Key regulatory changes in aged care services

Regulatory Strategy (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission Rules (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Accreditation and re-accreditation (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Timetable for improvement (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Assessment contacts (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Quality reviews (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Review audits (.pdf)

Key changes for providers from 1 January 2020 – Serious risk (.pdf)

Regulatory Bulletin – Assessment contacts in residential and home services (.docx)

Regulatory Bulletin – Responding to non-compliance with the Aged Care Quality Standards (.docx)

Regulatory Bulletin – Aged Care Quality Standards performance assessment methodology (.docx)

Regulatory Bulletin – Regulatory decision making (.docx)

Under section 9-1 of the Aged Care Act 1997 approved providers are required to notify the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commissioner of any change of circumstance that materially affects their suitability to be a provider of aged care.

Read more:

Notification of a material change form (.docx)

The Chair of the Royal Commission into the Aged Care Quality and Safety, the Honourable Gaetano Pagone QC, has today issued the following statement:

Public concern has been expressed about statements made by the Minister for Aged Care and Senior Australians that we had decided to support the privatisation of the Aged Care Assessment Teams in our Interim Report. I take this opportunity to make clear that the Interim Report did not endorse the Government’s stated position but noted that we would monitor with interest the implementation which the Government had announced. The Interim Report stated at p137 as follows:

Mr Tune’s Report raised concerns about the timeliness, quality and consistency of the assessment process under My Aged Care. He recommended a more rigorous and integrated assessment model, with the first step being the amalgamation of Regional Assessment Services with Aged Care Assessment Teams, and later incorporation of the residential care assessment function which sets personal funding levels, and is currently undertaken by providers. The Government has announced that it will implement this recommendation and will integrate the two assessment workforces from 2020. The Royal Commission considers that this integration needs to be progressed urgently. We will, therefore, maintain a continued interest in these developments and will monitor their progress; we will make recommendations as necessary in the Final Report.

Read more:

Statement by Royal Commission Chair on ACAT privatisation