How are you preparing for reform?

Aged care in Australia is in a transformative period as the sector prepares for further reforms scheduled to be implemented throughout 2025.

These reforms are primarily driven by the findings of the 2021 Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety.

The Commission handed down multiple recommendations for addressing the quality, accessibility, and responsiveness of aged care services.

Navigating the proposed reforms will require a partnership with your software provider like never before. Your business’s success and the need for increased consumer satisfaction will require less admin and more time supporting consumer-facing activities.

In this article, we will explore the cascade effect of the proposed coming changes.

A New Aged Care Act

A new Aged Care Act bill was introduced to Parliament in September and may be passed in the coming weeks.

If passed, the new Aged Care Act is expected to take effect on 1 July 2025. This long-awaited legislation has been in the works since March 2021. Following a lengthy consumer and provider consultation period, a draft has been tabled for parliamentary discussion and voting.

As we approach the release of this legislation, aged care providers will need to understand their business better than ever before and scrutinise their current systems and processes for efficiency.

All providers should ask themselves whether their current software is innovative, adaptable, and likely to respond to the required changes.

A New Regulatory Model

The proposed new regulatory model will follow if and when the Act is passed.

The proposed new regulatory model has four pillars, which the Australian Government developed in collaboration with consumers receiving or about to receive care.

These pillars are as follows: 

1. Care is rights-based – supported by the statement of rights
2. Care is person-centred – fostering partnerships
3. Care is risk proportionate – preventive, detecting, and correcting risks
4. Care is focused on continuous improvement – building a learning reflective culture.

This model will include a registration period during which all providers will be “deemed” into one or more of six categories. The determination will depend on the service types that the provider offers.

The proposed registration categories are:

1. Category One – Home and Community Services
2. Category Two – Assistive Technology and Home modifications
3. Category Three – Advisory and Support services
4. Category Four – Personal Care Supports in Home or Community
5. Category Five – Nursing and Transitional Care
6. Category Six – Residential Care (including respite)

Understanding each category will be essential for your organisation to ensure compliance and deliver quality care. It will also assist in planning which categories will be assessed against the proposed new strengthened aged care standards. Complying with the new regulatory model will require an up-to-date and easily accessible self-assessment tool that can support continuous improvement within your organisation.

Does your current software system have a self-assessment tool to help you link the care you provide with your organisation’s continuous improvement register? OneTouch does. If you’d like to see it in action, click here to book a demo.

Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards

The strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards will follow the Act and the New Regulatory model.

These streamlined, enhanced guidelines are being introduced to improve the safety, quality, and consumer experience of aged care services.

Key changes will include:

• Each standard has a statement of expectation for the older person
• The introduction of a dedicated nutrition standard focusing on clinical care of weight loss and improving the excellence of food provision.
• Greater emphasis on a rights-based, person-centred approach, respecting the cultures and backgrounds of older people, and ensuring care is trauma-aware.
• Enhanced partnerships with older consumers to ensure their preferences and choices are central to care decisions.
• A dedicated clinical care standard with a specific focus on a safe, quality, and multidisciplinary approach to managing clinical care needs.
• Requirements designed to ensure that the whole organisation, including the governing body, is responsible for the care and well-being of older people.
• Each new standard refers to the “responsible persons” within three subsections (the governing body, organisation, and worker). These subsections are then broken down into specific action and care guidelines for each.

Expanded National Aged Care Quality Indicator Program

The National Aged Care Mandatory Quality Indicator Program (QI Program) will be expanding to accommodate the addition of new quality indicators.

The three new quality indicators will measure the staffing contributions of:

• Enrolled Nurses
• Allied Health Professionals
• Lifestyle Officers

Integrating the measurement of these roles into the aged care reporting framework helps providers comply with care minute requirements.

Data collection for these indicators is required to commence on 1 April 2025, with the first reporting deadline occurring on 21 July 2025.

As we approach this date, providers should consider how their current care management system enables them to collect and report data for the QI Program.

Data ownership is critical. A care management system must allow you to easily retrieve all the rich data that your team enters into it.

A platform like OneTouch, which contains a reporting suite and an open API, is essential for extracting data in your preferred format.

The ability to upload data to tools like Power BI for further analysis and directly to government portals ensures that you can quickly meet regulatory reporting requirements.

How user-friendly is your current reporting system? Can you easily retrieve data on clinical care and hours worked?

OneTouch features an integrated care minute tool developed in partnership with aged care providers. This tool is designed to be user-friendly while enabling real-time data and analysis for payroll and reporting needs.

More Information

Keep an eye out for our upcoming blogs, which will focus on ways that software systems can help support the care industry through these changes. We hope to see the IHACPA dollar value for services released this month so that all providers can plan for the 2025/2026 budget and beyond.

In the meantime, you can book a demo with our team to explore how OneTouch can help future-proof your organisation.