Aged Care is a highly-regulated sector and our reporting obligations increase continually to ensure the continued safety, health, well-being and quality of life of our residents.
The Australian government recently introduced a Serious Incident Response Scheme (SIRS), which aims to prevent and reduce incidents of abuse and neglect in residential aged care services.
The SIRS scheme also focusses on incident management and incident reporting.
Alwyndor along with all aged care residential service providers is now complying with the SIRS. We have systems in place for preventing, managing, and responding to any incidents that may cause harm to an older person and to identify and report any serious incidents to the Commission. We will contact the family of any resident who is impacted by a SIRS.
Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety
Established in October 2018, the Royal Commission has undertaken hearings across Australian and accepted hundreds of submissions culminating in 148 recommendations for the fundamental reform of the aged care system.
In May 2021, the Australian Government accepted 126 of the 148 recommendations in full or in principle and which have been structured in a 5-year reform plan around:
- Home care - at home support and care based on assessed needs
- Residential aged care services and sustainability - improving service suitability that ensures individual care needs and preferences are met
- Residential aged care quality and safety - improving access to and quality of residential care
- Workforce - growing a bigger, more highly skilled, caring and values based workforce
- Governance - new legislation and stronger governance.
We are currently awaiting the implementation and associated funding impacts of this plan. We will keep our communities informed as the full impacts become known. The full government response can be found below.