Amid the rising demand for aged care services, the Retirement Living Council (RLC) is pressing the Australian government for significant reforms in how home care services are funded and delivered.
By introducing a “shared care” framework, RLC suggested retirement communities could directly provide home care services to their residents, fostering healthier, more independent lives for older Australians.
Daniel Gannon (pictured above), executive director of RLC, emphasised the urgent need for reform in the face of Australia’s aging population, projected to see a 70% increase in individuals over 75 by 2040. He also said that retirement living communities are “perfectly placed” to help provide home care services.
“Retirement communities can deliver better outcomes, experiences, and value for older Australians accessing care – and there are benefits for government too,” Gannon said in a media release.
“More than 1 million Australians currently utilise home care services, ranging from transport to personal care. Some of these people are waiting for up to a year to access home care funding, and sadly a third of this funding is lost to administration fees before it can be used.”
RLC’s proposed shared care model aims to alleviate the issues by enabling more efficient, community-based care within retirement villages.
The framework promises to make home care delivery up to 20% more efficient, potentially saving the Commonwealth up to $100 million annually.
“This shared care approach would provide three models for retirement village operators to deliver community-based care services under the Support at Home program within the village setting, either independently or through a delivery partner,” Gannon said.
“These models have been developed to show that significant efficiencies and savings to consumers and government can be achieved, even at moderate levels of uptake, with no cost to government.
“This is because retirement villages provide scale for delivering these services efficiently and cost effectively by reducing travel costs incurred by service providers, increasing the frequency of service delivery and enhancing the quality and suite of services by leveraging those already in place at these communities.”
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