Middle-aged men and women are having conversations about a subject they dread: what to do about Mum or Dad.
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Aged care is a compassion business and that can only be delivered by the touch, tone, respect and love provided by professional staff.
The numbers are staggering. There are 400,000 Australians over the age of 85. There are 320,000 living with dementia and both numbers will skyrocket over the coming decade.
Perhaps frail and living at home with advancing dementia, in hospital after a fall or struggling far away with diabetes or a chronic heart condition, they will have again become the centrepiece of their children's lives. Those parents may be understanding and co-operate with the plans being made for their future, or they may be in testy denial. Those with dementia may have no idea why their children are even discussing such matters.
There are unspoken burdens of guilt and regret felt by those who have to put their ageing relative into residential care.
The one thing that most of us want more than anything from facilities caring for loved ones is improved quality of care. A great location, beautiful garden and lovely furnishings are all welcome – and often used to market a home – but it is the quality of care demonstrated through the numbers, training and empathy of residential care staff that makes the difference.
Aged care is a compassion business and that can only be delivered by the touch, tone, respect and love provided by professional staff. That is why the decisions taken by the federal government in recent months to make the $1.2 billion budget savings from residential aged care are so difficult to fathom.
For our Mums and Dads, for ourselves and for our nation, we need aged care to be an election issue.
These are the men and women who made us and built our nation. The lives they lived, the work they did and the taxes they paid were a down payment on their current care needs. They are now tired and old, and frail and vulnerable.
They actually need the Prime Minister and the Opposition Leader to speak up for them. Who else is more deserving?
John Watkins is CEO of Alzheimer's Australia NSW and the chair of Calvary Health Care. The full article first appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald.