Report shows the number of community aged care packages is increasing

The report, Aged care packages in the community 2006-07, released today by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, looked at three different aged care packages and the types of clients they serve; Community Aged Care Packages (CACPs) which had almost 38,000 operational places; Extended Aged Care at Home (EACH) had 3,300 places and EACH Dementia had 1,300 places.

According to the report, women made up the majority of care recipients for all three programs, particularly for the CACP program (71%). EACH recipients had the youngest age profile, with 7% of recipients aged less than 65 years and only 53% aged 80 years and over, while CACP recipients had the oldest age profile (65% were 80 years and over).

‘At the end of June 2007, almost 35,000 people were receiving help from a CACP, almost 3,000 people were getting help from an EACH package and around 870 people from an EACH Dementia package,’ said Ann Peut, Head of the AIHW’s Ageing and Aged Care Unit.

‘However, over the course of the year, higher numbers of people actually received help from these packages,’ she said.

Around 50,000 people received a CACP at some time during 2006-07, and around 4,600 people and 1,340 people received help from EACH and EACH Dementia packages, respectively.

Around half of CACP recipients and three-quarters of EACH recipients used assistance from their package for less than 12 months. The majority of those leaving a care package did so to enter residential aged care. EACH Dementia recipients were more likely to enter residential care (63%) than CACP recipients (47%) or EACH recipients (43%). A higher proportion of EACH recipients no longer received assistance from their package because they died (37%) than EACH Dementia (22%) or CACP recipients (18%).

For more information go to www.aihw.gov.au