Protecting the Rights of Older Australians

Painaustralia is calling for leadership at the national level to protect the rights of older Australians in aged care facilities to access best-practice treatment and management for chronic pain. 

Australia’s Aged Care Quality Assessment and accreditation framework as well as our National Aged Care Quality Regulatory Processes (both currently under review) need reform to ensure effective best-practice pain management is available to all residents of aged care facilities.

Painaustralia CEO Carol Bennett says our aged care facilities are falling short when it comes to chronic pain.

“Effectve pain management should be a fundamental right for all older residents in aged care,” she said.

“We need aged care staff who are appropriately trained in pain assessment and management. We need reporting practices that include pain and we need appropriate multidisciplinary care.

“This means we have to reform the current government funding provisions to ensure people with pain can get the right care. Anything less is denying appropriate care to our older generation.”

It is estimated up to 80% of aged care residents live with chronic pain and effective pain management should be a core responsibility of all providers.  Unfortunately evidence suggests many residents with pain are poorly treated or under-treated.  This is despite 95% of aged care facilities passing accreditation and highlights a serious problem needing reform.

In many cases cognitive or other communicative impairments mean residents are unable to report pain.  This situation is compounded by lack of training in pain assessment and management for aged care staff with day-to-day responsibilities for residents.

Anecdotal information suggests advocacy from family members is often insufficient to have pain investigated or painkillers prescribed.

There are also challenges with reporting pain in cognitively intact people, and the lack of facility protocols and industry guidelines for pain assessment and reporting are inadequate to ensure quality care.

Poorly or unmanaged pain can lead to poorer quality of life for residents and distress for their families, inappropriate use of chemical and physical restraints, and a greater burden of care for staff.

Please download our submissions to national inquiries to find out more.

• Submission to the Review of National Aged Care Regulatory Processes
• Submission to the Review of Effectiveness of the Aged Care Quality Assessment and accreditation framework for protecting residents from abuse and poor practices, and ensuring proper clinical and medical care standards are maintained and practised