Dementia Care Navigator
Dementia Australia’s Dementia Care Navigator program helps people navigate the health system and access the right support services whilst seeking a dementia diagnosis or following a diagnosis. Families and carers are also provided with support.
Care Finder
The Care Finder program, a newly commissioned service under the Healthy Ageing program, connects vulnerable older people living in the community with Care Finders who provide a range of support services, from liaising with My Aged Care, to coordinating assessments and navigating the many aged care services that are available. In Western Sydney, Aspire4Life and Your Side, Wesley Mission and Hammond Care are offering the Care Finder service.
In the first six months, the Care Finder teams have provided support to over 150 older people, 100% of whom reported that the program was appropriate for their needs, the provider was trustworthy, and they were satisfied with the outcome of their engagement.
Palliative Care Team
This year our End of Life and Palliative Care team has coordinated and facilitated a series of webinars for primary care providers, partnered with Dementia Australia to present community Advance Care sessions, offered a 12-month subscription to 120 health professionals for the Dementia Learning Hub, and continue to work closely with palliative care services to build streamlined pathways of care. These partnerships aim to give communities greater choices at home for palliative care services.
A GP in Western Sydney was contacted by a family concerned about their father, Rob*, a 94-year-old man with a history of chronic kidney disease, renal failure, diabetes, atrial fibrillation, coronary artery bypass graft and a pacemaker.
Rob’s shortness of breath had grown more severe, and his family wanted him to be comfortable at home in his last days and no longer wanted to call an ambulance to take him to the hospital.
Thanks to our webinar training and follow-up visits from WentWest’s End of Life and Palliative Care team, the GP had become aware of a service provider that provides in-home palliative care services. Within a couple of hours, the provider was able to visit Rob’s home to provide him with medication to keep him comfortable, and his bed was set up in a comfortable position.
The family had time to contact other family members, and, over the weekend, the house was full of laughter, conversations, singing, praying, and celebrating his life.
A day later, Rob died in his own home, surrounded by his family.
RACF Community of Practice
Over the past few years, Residential Aged Care Facilities (RACFs) have faced unprecedented challenges and disruptions. Effective leadership, business resilience and “joy at work” are crucial factors to improving both staff and residents experiences, which is why, this year, we developed and led a ‘Residential Aged Care Facility Leadership and Business Resilience’ program. So far, the program has supported 60 participants, including aged care Registered Nurses, quality and clinical managers, executive teams and other allied health professionals working within RACFs.
Leaders at all levels were engaged in creating meaningful and sustainable change through coaching and the provision of tools that facilitate a positive team culture, implement digital health, and improve business processes and workflows. The program provided a comprehensive learning and development framework, one-on-one coaching and mentoring sessions and practical tools to implement the learnings into practice. Co-designed and delivered by a multi-disciplinary team with medical, nursing, business development, coaching and mentoring expertise, the program's success has had positive significance for practice, policy, and structural change in the field of primary health care nursing.
In our Annual Needs Survey,
81%
of RACF staff respondents rated their satisfaction with WentWest's support as 'high' or 'very high'
In the past year, there were over
743
attendees to our fortnightly RACF community of practice webinars
* Name changed to protect the person's identity.