Private home care needs accreditation

The founder of private home care company, Dutiful Daughters has called for greater monitoring of community care providers which receive no government funding.

Speaking at the company’s tenth anniversary celebrations, Helen Whitney said it was “very scary” that the sector was so unregulated.

“Because there are obviously no compulsory regulations in this industry, anyone can just come in and open up a business,” she said.

Dutiful Daughters has been accredited with the Australian Council on Health Standards since 2002 and recently received a further four years of accreditation.

The company’s new owner and managing director, Kathy Forrest also stressed the importance of independent validation for private home care operators.

“I think people need to be accredited by a set of independent rules and regulations,” she said.

“They need someone to report to and be accountable to.”

Dutiful Daughters provides care in Sydney’s eastern and northern suburbs and Ms Forrest said plans for further expansion are on the cards, although she would not reveal where.

“We are really focused on launching our services further afield,” she said.

“Once we had our care business up and running, we demonstrated that we could provide services in other areas without losing that personal touch.”

The care business is also looking into electronic care solutions to ease the paperwork burden on its staff.