General News
13 July, 2023
Regional aged care summit examines local challenges
More than 100 regional aged care providers, including the Maryborough District Health Service (MDHS), came together in Mildura last week in a bid to address challenges faced by the industry. Organised by the Shadow Assistant Minister for Regional...
More than 100 regional aged care providers, including the Maryborough District Health Service (MDHS), came together in Mildura last week in a bid to address challenges faced by the industry.
Organised by the Shadow Assistant Minister for Regional Health and Member for Mallee Anne Webster, the Regional Aged Care Summit was called to address immediate viability concerns for the regional aged care sector.
Facilitated by former Australian Deputy Chief Medical Officer Dr Nick Coatsworth, the forum saw service providers speak about the issues they face and solutions moving forward.
One point of conversation was the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, which was accepted by the Australian Government and made 148 recommendations to overhaul the existing system.
Among those recommendations was that residential care facilities needed to ensure staff spent at least 200 minutes per day with residents, with at least 40 of those minutes with a registered nurse.
“Nobody in the room objects to the Royal Commission recommendations. The trouble is, they were made before the pandemic and the dire worker shortages we are now experiencing,” Dr Webster said.
“Almost every provider, particularly those in smaller regional centres, said it was almost impossible to meet the government’s current requirements.
“The energy in the room showed these providers have a firm commitment to making their sector better for residents, their families, and their own staff.
“The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commissioner and the federal department undertook to respond to the recommendations from this summit and we look forward to what they have to say to our providers.”
MDHS provides residential aged care at its Wattle Rise facility in Maryborough as well as in Avoca and Dunolly.
The service’s executive director nursing, midwifery and allied health Robyn Wilson said workforce shortages were the key issue in terms of delivering aged care services.
“Across the board the biggest challenge is the workforce,” she said.
“We have to be creative about how we approach our workforce and how we support existing staff while attracting new staff.
“One of the approaches we’ve taken here is around growing our own workforce, we have staff who started as personal care attendants at a certificate level entry and have gone on to do further training to become registered nurses.
“We’ve also got 17 nurses training through a partnership we have with Bendigo TAFE. It’s the second year we’ve run this program and it’s been a really successful way of providing access to education and employment locally.”
Ms Wilson said she felt it was important for MDHS to be involved with the summit not only to hear about issues other service providers face, but to help find a solution.
“There are a couple of reasons we wanted to be involved in the summit and one of these was that the summit brought together people from across regional and rural Australia to talk about the challenges of delivering both residential and home-based aged care,” she said.
“It really is important for us to hear what others are doing in that space and also to help be part of solutions and it was a very solutions focussed summit.
“From a public health perspective the challenges for workforce are absolute but public health services in Victoria have always been staffed by registered and enrolled nurses so we don’t have to undergo that change that privatised aged care does.”
Maryborough’s other major aged care provider Havilah was unable to attend the summit, but CEO Tracey Saunders said the biggest difficulty the aged care provider faced was around staffing.
“We’ve got jobs advertised at the moment and trying to fill those jobs as well as trying to fill our floor staff positions is a challenge,” she said.
“It’s virtually impossible to meet the government reforms regarding registered nurses and the amount of time they spend with residents.
“When we’re short staffed we have to call on agencies who provide staff, but at a very high cost.
“It’s a double edged sword really, agency staff cost a lot to get in to fill shifts but if we don’t get them in, we’re short-staffed.”
Following the summit, Ms Saunders said she’s hopeful more funding will become available for the sector, also noting the challenges around local housing constraints.
“I am hopeful there’ll be some more support in terms of funding to get staff on board,” she said.
“As a not-for-profit, we can’t afford to pay staff the amounts that agencies can, so support to help us stay competitive would be great.
“That being said, even if we are able to attract staff there isn’t a lot of housing available so there’s little reason to come to the area for work.”