Will the Federal Budget, which will be announced in May, be a budget supporting older Australians? LiveWell Care has been calling for the introduction of an integrated set of consumer supports, including ‘system navigators’ and outreach services to help people navigate the system to support an increase in take up of Home Care Packages and reduce the wait times for Home Care Packages to be assigned.
The Letter is in the mail…
The Department of Health has commenced notifying older people waiting on the national queue for Home Care Packages three months before they are assigned a Home Care Package. The measure aims to reduce the time taken for individuals to activate their package and increase the overall take up. Although consumers have 56 days to take up a Home Care Package from the time of assignment, the Department of Health has advised that 54 percent of consumers it surveyed had not started researching providers 35 days after being assigned a package. The Department of Health’s research also showed 31 percent of people who had been assigned a package had decided not to take it up but hadn’t opted out of the queue.
Massive Growth in approved Home Care Package Providers
LiveWell Care’s mantra is “Choice is a great thing as long as you know your options, otherwise it can be confusing”. The federal government’s reduction in red tape has allowed more providers to become approved home care providers with the number of industry continuing to grow rapidly. At the end of December there were 806 approved providers, up 61 percent from mid-2016. With so many choices LiveWell Care has been calling for more transparency of charges, which approved providers take out of the Home Care Package subsidy. Currently approved providers are only required to advise of their exit fees on the My Aged Care website service finder.
More Packages Released but how many are being taken up?
The Department of Health assigned 50,000 home care packages to consumers over the December quarter, 17,000 more than the previous quarter. Despite this the national queue continues to grow, with 104,602 on the queue as of 31 December 2018 (an increase of 3% on the previous quarter). Data relating to the number of Home Care Packages taken up during this quarter has not been made available.