Catering to older tourists

FAR North care services are looking to expand what they can offer for elderly and disabled tourists.

Eighty-three thousand domestic tourists a year who travel to the Far North are in need of age or disability care according to a new feasibility study funded under the Federal Government’s Regional Jobs and Investment Package.

Ten Years Younger Home Care chief executive Kevin Fields said it identified a growing market in assisted care for travellers.

“The surveys conducted across Australia indicated that the current market size for domestic “assisted care” for travellers to TNQ could employ around 50 full-time additional staff at full capacity,” he said.

Mr Fields said he noticed the gap in services after being called upon to find emergency care for a New Zealand tourist with extreme dementia after her husband suffered a heart attack while staying at a Palm Cove hotel in 2016.

“They (the hotel) were calling to ask me what agency could assist with something like this at 5pm on a Friday afternoon,” he said.

“They didn’t have the facilities to look after this lady, her husband was about to take up a bed at Cairns Hospital, and we had to do what we could to organise care at short notice.”

Federal Leichhardt MP Warren Entsch said expanding care services would allow more visitors to experience Far North tourism.

“It we can adopt these recommendations, it gives more reason for people to come to Cairns,” he said.

Mr Fields said they were aiming to develop a new service model based on the findings by mid-2019.