As the sector awaits news on the government’s Severe Behaviour Response Teams, which were due to begin this month, new figures on dementia prevalence prompt call for new strategies.
New figures show that more than half of residents have dementia, and that dementia prevalence is 14 times higher among residents than the estimated rates for their age, highlighting that dementia is now “core business” for providers, a peak body has said.
According to the Australian Institute Health and Welfare’s Residential aged care and Home Care 2013-14 report, 52 per cent of all people in permanent residential aged care had a diagnosis of dementia.
Furthermore, 43 per cent of permanent residents aged 65 to 74 had a diagnosis of dementia, compared to just 3 per cent of the same age group in the general population thought to have dementia, it found.
Responding to the figures, peak body Leading Age Services Australia said the report showed that new dementia management strategies were needed.
“The data reported by AIHW is evidence that dementia management is no longer a niche area of aged care, but a necessary core competency required by anyone working in home care or residential care,” LASA chief executive officer Patrick Reid said.
Providing aged services to people with dementia required a different approach today than it has in the past, which involved ensuring home care and residential care staff had the right skills and access to suitable training, he said.
Mr Reid said the government should hold a second dementia summit “that it promised to properly review and consider policy options in light of this new evidence.”
Response teams due to commence this month
The new AIHW figures come as the sector awaits news on the start of the Federal Government’s new Severe Behaviour Response Teams, which will target residents with very severe and extreme behaviours of dementia and offer immediate crisis management to facilities, as well as follow-up assistance such as training and up-skilling of staff.
As Australian Ageing Agenda has reported, the multidisciplinary clinical teams were due to commence in September, following a delayed opening of the competitive tender, rather than the department’s slated midyear target.
An initial funding contract of $12.7 million will be allocated until June 2016, after which the response teams will be integrated with DBMAS to form a single program.
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