Victorian aged care facility rostering five staff to more than 100 patients, royal commission hears

ABC News
October 17 2009


Nursing homes are notoriously secretive about their staffing ratios. But buried among the hundreds of witness statements submitted to the aged care royal commission was a table showing how one of the country's biggest for-profit chains employed just five staff for 106 residents on the night shift.   
Key points:

    The Japara Mirridong aged care home rostered just one registered nurse overnight
    Union head Paul Gilbert told the inquiry staff there had just six minutes to wash and dress patients
    The Health Workers Union said aged care staff could earn more working at supermarkets

The figures came from the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF) and they're about Japara — a company publicly listed on the stock exchange.

The table shows how Japara Mirridong in Bendigo employs 15 personal care workers in the morning, which drops to 11 after lunch, and finally to just four personal care workers and one registered nurse for the night shift.

Paul Gilbert, assistant secretary of the Victorian branch of the ANMF said the ratios were "madness".
A document tabled at the aged care royal commission outlining patient/staff ratios at the Japara Mirridong Aged Care Home.
The table shows a ratio of one registered nurse to 106 patients is "standard" at the home. (Supplied: Aged care royal commission)

"People are getting six minutes to get a resident out of bed, washed, in a chair, in a lounge room. It's just madness," he told the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety.

According to the union head, the reason for the low staffing levels across the industry is reforms made by the Howard government in 1997.

Previously, 70 to 75 per cent of federal government funds were quarantined for staff wages.

Those nursing homes that did not comply had to return the unused funds to the government, and it was stringently monitored.

But following the changes, that quarantine of funds for wages disappeared.

"From this time onwards, homes were required to meet accreditation, rather than allocate protected funding to nursing," Mr Gilbert's statement said.

Mr Gilbert said the effect was almost immediate, with another Japara home, George Vowell in Victoria, dropping its proportion of spending to 56 per cent.
'I could get paid more working on the checkout of Aldi'

It is not just staff numbers under the spotlight but also the pay rates.

"The comment I hear is, 'I could get paid more working on the check out of Aldi', and it's technically true," the Health Workers Union's Lisa Alcock told the royal commission.
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Personal care workers are supposed to be paid $20 to $25 an hour, but the union said it had to step in when workers were grossly underpaid.

She cited one worker being paid $15 an hour for the past seven years, working six days a week.

Ms Alcock didn't name the provider but said: "I estimate this underpayment is in excess of $120,000. This matter is ongoing."

Both unions spoke of the difficulties of negotiating enterprise agreements because providers consistently said they were underfunded.

Darren Mathewson from Aged and Community Services Australia said the viability of smaller providers — particularly in regional areas — would be under threat if wages increased, even if the Federal Government increased its aged care funding.

"The Commonwealth announces an increase to subsidies by 1.4 per cent and, therefore, for that organisation which may have limited reserves," he told the commission.

"And I'm probably talking about single service regional providers who may be in the midst of bargaining, then it becomes a real pressure valve in wanting to meet the wage claims which may well be valid of their employees and then continuing to operate"

whiteknight wrote on Oct 17^th, 2019 at 4:49am:


Surprise, surprise. The rodent strikes again.

cods wrote on Oct 17^th, 2019 at 6:17am:


What makes you think im upset? You usually ask that question so i answered ahead of time. It was villagio BTW.

Spot

Aged care is a huge problem
The number of people over the age of 80 is set to quadruple in the next 15 years
There is simply no way that this enormous number of people can be given the very best of modern technological healthcare
The best of food
The best of physiotherapy occupational therapy podiatry
The best of nursing care

There is no way that this can be afforded by the budget

Probably what will happen is that the government will be forced to take ownership of the family home and use the funds from that asset to look after people in retirement

Another option would be for people to just accept much much lower levels of care
But if that's the case they will have to stop the complaining

The third option would be for families to get together and look after old people on the understanding the family home will then be available as an asset to be split amongst the family members further down the track

There is no simple solution to this

But just being a little cry baby and throwing a tantrum like a 3 year old and expecting mummy. In this case the federal government acting as your mummy to give you everything you want is never ever ever going to happen
It is a bottomless pit and the government cannot poor endless resources into it

Exactly that money is currently taken as a bond but the family get a fair degree of it back when the person passes away
The government is still subsidizing the care to great extent
People don't realise how expensive nursing home care is
It's probably way cheaper to have a room at the Hilton then to be in a nursing home where staff have to permanently be paid 3 shifts a day to attend to your care
That is massively expensive and the government and operators are always going to try and do that on the cheap
well it's not really cheap but they have no option other than to cut staff numbers to try and keep the costs under control to some extent
I just wait and see what happens when the number of elderly people quadruples
The staff are run off their feet already
Try funding that model and expecting the staff to look after four times as many people

It is never ever ever going to happen and it is a totally unrealistic expectation that it could happen
if you are a 60-year-old and think that you are going to receive some gold standard of nursing home care  in 15 years' time or 20 years time you are out of your mind

Unfortunately Aqua is right, this is all about money. 

Most of these aged care places are profit driven.  There are only limited amount of public funding, and since those companies (e.g. BUPA), have to answer to their shareholders, they have to lower the cost, and that means:
1. Less quality and quantity of food
2. Inferior quality of equipment.
3. Poor individual pay rates, and reduction of staff numbers.

This is why you see, something like 2 to 4 staff per 100 resident per night.  And all it takes is one sick resident... which is not unusual for facility of that size due to age demographic, then the shifts are chaotic. 

juliar wrote on Oct 17^th, 2019 at 2:33pm:


Are you volunteering?

juliar wrote on Oct 17^th, 2019 at 4:45pm:


I hope you end up in one of those LNP run profit driven nursing homes taking kerosene baths LOL