18 April 2000

Nurses forecast decline in quality of care

"Recent reporting of major problems in the quality of residential aged care in Victoria highlights what is in reality a national problem. It is not news to nurses," said Professor Judy Lumby, Executive Director of the NSW College of Nursing. "In 1997, in response to the first draft of the Aged Care Act, the NSW College of Nursing expressed concerns that nurses would be unable to guarantee that residents of aged care facilities will receive the standard of care they require or that they will be safe."

Professor Lumby added that "…we have repeated that claim many times since then - various Senate inquiries and the Productivity Commission being just two instances."

"Last year's Productivity Commission report into Nursing Home Subsidies demonstrated very clearly that the numbers of appropriately qualified and experienced nurses were diminishing and that achievement of the standards required of residential aged care facilities must be made possible by adequate funding," Professor Lumby went on to say.

"Our concern has been borne out - we are witnessing a decline in the numbers of professional nursing staff and the results of inadequate funding to address quality of care issues - unless the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency is appropriately funded to allow them to proceed with the business of accreditation, then older people in residential care will continue to suffer," Professor Lumby said.

"The New South Wales College of Nursing has been and continues to be very involved in the roll out of the aged care structural reforms initiated in 1997 and has contributed significantly to the critical debate about the effects of these reforms on behalf of older people and the nursing profession. We believe the government's response to the Productivity Commission report has been completely inadequate and in effect all but ignores the eighteen recommendations that arose from it. We also maintain that horrific, albeit at present isolated, incidents such as we have witnessed in Victoria, will continue to surface."

"While providers of residential aged care have to keep doing more with less then obviously patient care will be compromised. And while the funding arrangements in the aged care sector remain at the levels they are, registered and enrolled nurse numbers will continue to decline," Professor Lumby said.

"To compound the problem, there are currently a number of factors determining the difficulty in attracting qualified and experienced nurses to the aged care sector, some of which are related to perceived poor working conditions and pay. It is ironic that stories that highlight such conditions probably serve to further deter nurses from seeking employment in residential aged care. Clearly this is not acceptable and such irony only strengthens our resolve to keep the pressure on Government to address the situation to the satisfaction of consumers and providers of care."