Personal and clinical care least complied standard
Personal and clinical care was the most unmet quality standard in residential aged care facilities over the past 12 months, says analysis.
Crunching Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission data to uncover non-compliance trends during 2021-22, aged care consultancy firm Pride Living found Standard 3 — personal and clinical care — the most unmet quality standard during the period, followed by Standard 7 (human resources) and Standard 8 (organisational governance).
“There is clear and consistent evidence of which areas providers should focus their internal audit activity on if they wish to avoid a non-compliance notice, NTA and sanction,” said Pride Living on its website.
With the regulatory body ramping up its audits over July 2021 to June 2022, higher instances of non-compliance have been recorded during that time.
Indeed, the rate of non-compliance relative to the commission’s activity has more than doubled in the last 12 months — “the more one looks, the more one finds.”
While Pride Living doesn’t have data on the relative number of audits and assessment contacts by provider location, size and ownership, it compared the rate of non-compliance with the representation of providers.
Using this method, Pride Living found that outer regional, single-site and not-for-profit providers were more likely to receive a non-compliance notice, notices to agree or a sanction.
The analysis also discovered that major city, for-profit, and providers with more than 10 facilities were less likely to receive a non-compliance notice, NTA or sanction.
Meanwhile, comparing state and territories over the first six months of 2022, Victoria was found to be the jurisdiction attracting relatively low commission activity, while NSW has had proportionately higher activity over the period.
“This,” said Pride Living, “suggests that having a well-resourced/funded clinical governance is protective against these negative outcomes.”
The one key piece of data Pride Living couldn’t get from the commission is the rate at which initial findings of non-compliance vary from the final decision. “Clearly, preparing submissions is a time intensive and costly exercise,” Pride Living said.
Looking forward
Unless there are COVID outbreaks, Pride Living expects contact visits to remain at about 500 per quarter and audit activity to continue increasing from its current base of 320.
While approximately 18 per cent of providers subject to a contact or audit will have some form of non-compliance, only three per cent of providers audited will get either an NTA or a sanction, Pride Living predicts.
Tips
To improve outcomes, Pride Living suggests providers:
- focus on data quality and integrity of the recently updated quality indicator program and the updated Serious Incident Response Scheme guidelines
- test your systems and ensure this is the right approach
- ensure you are compliant in key requirements as that will reduce the risk of a form of non-compliance
- improve organisational culture — happy staff results in happy customers.
The eight Aged Care Quality Standards offer providers, people working in the sector, older Australians and their families a shared understanding of what is expected in aged care.
A revised version of the quality standards is currently up for public consultation until 25 November.
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