With the residential aged care sector moving to 215 mandated minutes of care on Tuesday, there are signs that compliance around the requirements is tightening and this will hit operators where it hurts the most.
Minister for Aged Care, Anika Wells, issued a letter to residential aged care providers dated 1 October 2024 noting her ‘disappointment’ with the failure of some operators, mainly For Profits, to meet care minute requirements despite increased funding over the past two years.
Given these letters are usually authored by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commissioner, Janet Anderson, it indicates a change in tone from the Australian Government.
Until now, the regulator has taken a risk-based approach to monitoring care minutes with those operators not meeting care minutes often the same recording better profit margins.
But we understand that the Commission is now becoming more particular about those homes that aren’t meeting their minutes. This will force operators to increase their staff which in turn will hit bottom lines.
There could also be more serious repercussions on the way.
New Act to ‘enshrine’ care minutes
The wording of the proposed new Aged Care Act suggests care minutes will be enshrined in the legislation.
While there is no specific mention of care minutes in the new Bill, section 176 states that “a registered provider of a kind prescribed by the rules must deliver direct care in accordance with any requirements prescribed by the rules.”
The Explanatory Memorandum expands on this statement by noting:
“This clause is intended to replicate current requirements in the Quality of Care Principles 2014 relating to Care Minutes for mainstream residential care providers, which is the amount of direct care that an individual living in an approved residential care home will receive from a registered nurse, enrolled nurse, personal care workers or nursing assistants. The rules may prescribe the amounts and average amounts of direct care that must be provided to each individual accessing funded aged care services.”
In short, the rules can specify what the care minutes will be. If providers don’t meet the requirements, will they then be in breach of the new Act?
The Minister does point in her letter to the development of “options to boost care minutes compliance” for homes in thin markets perhaps a reference to the Department of Health and Aged Care’s new virtual nursing pilot for homes struggling to meet 24/7 nursing requirements.
But for the majority of providers, particularly those in metro areas, the message seems to be: pull up your bootstraps or face the consequences.
