Launch of new awards scheme for care providers
The Australian Aged Care Quality Agency is launching its new 2015 Better Practice Awards scheme for home care and residential care providers.
Nick Ryan, Australian Aged Care Quality Agency chief executive.
The Awards will now promote and recognise improvement and better practice across the broad spectrum of aged care services, including home care, residential, National Respite for Carers and National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flexible care.
Nominations for this year’s Better Practice Awards open on Monday (25 May) and close 6 July.
The new award categories are:
- Organisational leadership and staff development
- Consumer directed care (CDC) and re-ablement
- Special needs
- Rural/remote/very remote
- Personal, medical and clinical care
- Environmental management/living environment
Nick Ryan, Australian Aged Care Quality Agency chief executive, says: “Through our Better Practice Awards, we want to recognise and showcase aged care providers that succeed in moving beyond minimum levels of compliance to demonstrate innovative and inspirational aged care practice.”
According to Mr Ryan, past winners of Better Practice Awards have told him that winning the Award has been a highlight of their career, and a “real morale booster” not only for staff, but also for consumers
“The judging criteria for the awards have also been improved, to ensure winning programs are original, evidence based, consumer focused, linked to continuous improvement and subject to evaluation,” Mr Ryan says.
Award winners will be announced at the final Better Practice conference for 2015 in Brisbane, and winners may be invited to present at next year’s Better Practice conferences.
The Australian Aged Care Quality Agency, which started on 1 January 2014, is the accreditation body for residential aged care homes. It conducts quality review of home care services; registers quality assessors; and provides information, education and training.
Access more information on the categories, eligibility, judging criteria and how to nominate.
