COMMUNICATIONS

New Service Aims To Help Older People Resume Daily Activities At Home

The Canterbury District Health Board is funding a new service which will see community support workers working with elderly people in their homes to help them resume daily activities.

The CDHB has awarded contracts for its new Community Supported Independent Living service to Presbyterian Support (Upper South Island) and Healthcare New Zealand.

Both organisations will employ community support workers to work with older people over 65 in their own homes. The aim is to build the older person’s confidence, enabling them to begin doing everyday activities again and to regain involvement in community activities. The community support worker will also support the client to access other health and welfare agencies and work closely with the older person’s family/whanau.

Presbyterian Support has been contracted to provide the service for frail elderly and people with mild to moderate dementia. Healthcare New Zealand has also been contracted to provide the service to these two groups and also to older people with mental health conditions.

The new service is part of the CDHB’s Older Persons’ Health Services strategy, called Healthy Ageing Integrated Support – Tautoko Whakahono Hauora Kaumatua. The CDHB already funds other services for older people, including carer support, respite, district nursing and day care.

Carole Kerr, CDHB Portfolio Manager Aged Care, says the aim of the new service is to support older people “most at risk of entering residential care prematurely” who need support to remain in their own homes.

The community support workers will work with older people to identify the type of activities they want help to do again and to examine how their goals can be achieved.

Penny Taylor, Business Development Manager for Presbyterian Support (Upper South Island), says 12 part-time trained staff and three co-ordinators will provide the programme for up to 93 clients in Christchurch, Rangiora and Ashburton, under the name of HomeLink.

She says the aim of the service, which will take its first clients on 28 May, is to boost the client’s independence.

“It’s not taking the place of residential care, it’s about supporting continued independence in the community. The focus is on enabling the older person to do what they have always done.”

“We will support older people to carry out activities of daily living. For example, with grocery shopping, it’s not doing a client’s shopping for them, its about transport to the supermarket and then walking around with the older person, they made the grocery list, push the trolley and select the groceries but the community support worker may help them to get food off the shelf and carry heavy bags from the car to the kitchen.”

Max Reid, Healthcare New Zealand Area Manager for the Upper South Island, says the organisation’s programmes will be delivered by six part-time staff, who will have eight to 10 clients each. The service will cover the area from Ashburton to Kaikoura.

A registered nurse will oversee the services for frail elderly and people with mild to moderate dementia while a mental health co-ordinator will supervise the third service.

He says the CDHB’s contract allows the organisation to employ staff on permanent part-time contracts and provide higher levels of training and support - a boost for a sector that traditionally has had a more casual workforce.

To access the service, older people must be referred by their GPs for a needs assessment at Older Persons’ Health, based at The Princess Margaret Hospital.

ENDS