Know someone who is looking for aged care? Are you asking the right questions?

If you or a loved one is looking for aged care it’s important to ask the right questions:

How will you support me to maintain connections and relationships?

What opportunities will I have to reflect on my legacy?

Who is available to be with me if I’m struggling?

Are you a member of Meaningful Ageing Australia?

DOWNLOAD OUR TOP TEN QUESTIONS HERE

How do organisations incorporate holistic care?

Truly integrated holistic care runs top to bottom and through many systems.

What you will experience are processes that show they understand and respond to meaning, purpose and connectedness (including with self, others, creativity, nature and perhaps something bigger) in the life of every older person. This means they value relationships, they clearly seek to get to know your important connections, and they offer opportunities for you to be nurtured and grow. People who have a faith will be connected with relevant people, rituals and traditions; however no assumptions will be made about what your faith means in your life. Understanding you and what sustains you will be a priority.  All staff will have basic professional development in spiritual care and in many organisations they have spiritual care practitioners or other staff focused on holistic wellbeing. These roles come under different titles, such as pastoral carer. Their job is ensuring that who you are and what matters to you is understood and responded to.

How do we work with organisations?

We support aged care organisations to integrate holistic care, which means helping them understand and respond to fully understanding and getting alongside each person. We provide lots of practical resources that help staff in all sorts of roles to do this. We find out where an organisation is on their journey to integrate holistic care and help them connect with the resources that they most need. We also run professional development with staff and volunteers.

Useful links

Organisations we work with
As well as creating engaging and useful products for older people, we work with a growing range of small and large aged care providers across Australia.
View the current list here.

 

Elder Abuse Hotline
1800 353 374

 

Council on the Ageing (COTA)
COTA Australia’s role is to promote, improve and protect the wellbeing of older people in Australia as citizens and consumers.
www.cota.org.au

 

My Aged Care
The portal to start engaging with the government-subsidised aged care system.
www.myagedcare.gov.au

 

Centre for Cultural Diversity in Ageing
Provides expertise in culturally inclusive policy and practices for the aged services sector. Includes information for people looking for services.
www.culturaldiversity.com.au

 

Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission
Protects and enhances the safety, health, well-being and quality of life of people receiving aged care.
www.agedcarequality.gov.au

 

Older Persons Advocacy Network
Older Persons Advocacy Network’s free services support older people and their representatives to address issues related to Commonwealth funded aged care services.
www.opan.com.au

 

How one organisation is incorporating holistic care into every day

For the past year they have been incorporating holistic care into every part of the day.

Acacia Care has been on a journey. Once they started to engage with integrated holistic care, their models were changed so that they could priortise relationships with each older person. When first using the service, each person has a visit with a trained staff member to have a “ConnecTo” conversation before completing clinical and financial processes. All staff who are working with the older person then ensure they are familiar with the person’s important connections, and build this in to conversations and plans. All staff in all roles now know that relationships are a priority, so in the course of their daily work they make sure they connect person-to-person. There’s a lot happening behind the scenes to support this, including nurturing the inner world of each staff member. They need this to sustain them in their work. Part of the training was to broaden the team’s understanding of spirituality. Most staff thought that spirituality was confined to religion, and that religion was just a series of rituals and occasional visits from local faith communities. They now understand that in places like Australia, spirituality is very broad and may or may not include religious faith.