More young people requiring care

The number of young people receiving support because they were living in residential care, or at risk of entering it, doubled between June 2007 and June 2008.

 A total of 580 people were using services funded by the Young People with Disability in Residential Aged Care program midway through last year, up from 260 the year before.

Close to 400 of the program users were living in residential aged care and 162 were in alternative support accommodation. The remaining 20 were in hospital.

However a report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) shows that in the same time period, the proportion of program users in residential care dropped from 78 to 68 per cent.

This is probably due to a shift in the program’s focus in the 12 months to June last year.

In that time, more program resources were directed towards preventing people who were living in the community from entering residential aged care.

Prior to this, the focus had mainly been on relocating younger people who were already living in nursing homes.

The predominant injury among the younger people involved in the program was acquired brain injury (ABI), which affected 46 per cent of the group. More than half of the younger people with ABI were living in residential aged care.

Neurological disability was the next most common disability.