Single rooms too expensive for aged care

Adele Horin writes in today's Age:

An aged-care survey by accountancy firm Grant Thornton showed modern high-care facilities with single bedrooms reported the worst financial results in 2008, with a return on investment of about 1 per cent. The operating profit on a bed in single-room facilities was about half that of older facilities with shared rooms.

A report by accountancy firm Stewart Brown showed more depressing results, with average operating losses of $10 a bed in single-room facilities, double that of shared-room facilities. Stewart Brown also reported that 70 per cent of high-care facilities in the non-profit sector were operating at a loss.

.....

The aged-care industry is stepping up its lobbying of the Federal Government to review the funding of nursing homes, known as high-care facilities. The Government will not allow operators to charge bonds for high-care facilities to avoid residents having to sell the family home. But nursing homes are allowed to charge a maximum, daily accommodation fee of $26.88 to help fund new buildings and refurbish old ones.

A group of church-based operators is expected to soon release a report that shows the charge needs to be increased to at least $40 a day.

The chief executive of Japara, a big private operator, Andrew Sudholz, recently told a Senate inquiry new high-care facilities were not being built because the cost "far exceeds the end value" under funding policies.

Operators said they had survived by building low-care facilities — or hostels — for which they are allowed to charge a bond.

Death with dignity

The ABC has recently broadcast a couple of interesting programs about dying with dignity.

Last week's Counterpoint on RN featured a discussion about the Oregon Death with Dignity Act, which permits physicians to write a prescription for qualified terminally ill patients.

The transcript, which IMO is worth reading, is available here .

Tonight I watched (for the first time) ABC2's repeat of its Fora (listed as "Flora" at p31 of today's Australian TV guide) IQ2 debate about euthanasia. Alas no transcript is available though the program website gives you an idea of the range of opinion as well as listing other times in the coming weeks when it will be shown again.

I was on the side of the pro-euthanasia supporters: Bob Brown, Phillip Nitschke (difficult to recognise in a suit) and Professor Peter Baume. Their adversaries were Dr Mara Cigolini (a palliative care medicine specialist), Tony Abbott and Father Frank Brennan SJ.

More older Australians opt to remain in their homes

Siobhain Ryan in The Australian reports an emerging trend in aged care:

Elderly Australians are breaking down the retirement village walls, with aged care operators lodging twice the interest in providing care in the community than in nursing homes.

Official figures obtained by The Australian show the federal Government has received 10 times the number of applications to provide care in people's homes as there are places available.

The 27,039 bids for the government-funded community care places dramatically outnumbered the 13,956 received for nursing home places.

Minister for Ageing, Justine Elliot, said the Government was looking at ways to expand community care in response to the demand. "It is wonderful that the aged-care sector are listening and responding to the concerns and preferences of older Australians," Ms Elliot said.

"Older Australians are telling us they want the choice to remain in their homes and only want to enter nursing homes when it is absolutely necessary.

"Older Australians are healthier and more active (when) they are in familiar surroundings."

Community care offers in-home support services such as cleaning, washing, showering and preparing meals for the frail aged, including those with dementia. Almost 465,000 Australians are forecast to develop dementia by 2031, more than double the current number, forcing many of them into nursing homes unless at-home services are available.

Sounds like an eminently sensible approach.