A duty of care to aged

MAKING the call to put an elderly loved one in aged care is one of the most difficult decisions we are ever likely to have to make.

Watching an elderly parent or family member struggle as age impairs their physical and mental capabilities can be confronting and create real conflict in well-meaning family members who strive to take care of their parent the way they were once cared for themselves.

For many people who have gone through this experience, the stories that are starting to emerge from the current Royal Commission into Aged Care must be the stuff of nightmares.

Cases of malnutrition, assault, financial abuse and the misuse of medication have already surfaced in the first few days of the hearing, with many of the problems already attributed to massive demand for services and understaffing.

The experiences of former Geelong mayor Bruce Adams, whose wife Janet was seriously injured while in an aged-care facility, was among the first lot of stories to be documented this week.

Janet suffered a serious hip injury after she was pushed by a male resident who she had begun a physical altercation with. As a result she had surgery, from which she never fully recovered and died six months later.

Her family believe that if there had been adequate staffing to tend to her tendency for aggression, which was a byproduct of her dementia, the incident — and subsequent injury — could have been avoided.

We suspect Janet’s story, and the many others like it, will be the tip of the iceberg when the royal commission wraps up its hearings. When there is so much money in the aged-care industry — and a rapidly ageing population — it is not surprising that there will be a tendency for greed to blind some operators to basic human needs.

But, just like our parents cared for us as we grew up, it is imperative our society discovers the best way to care for our elders. Then we can feel more at ease when that difficult decision time comes.