Accreditation of residential aged care facilities: experiences of service providers
The need to address the issue of quality in aged care service provision in Australia has received increasing emphasis in recent decades. Particularly since the 1980s, the federal government has played a key role in ensuring that this is the case through the implementation of various reforms and regulatory strategies. In 1998, the national standards monitoring system which had been in place since the mid 1980s was replaced with a new system based on an accreditation model. In contrast to the former system which was wholly controlled by government and involved one-off inspections by government standards monitors, responsibility for managing the new system has been devolved to an independent body, the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency. One of the Agency's primary functions is to assess compliance with the accreditation standards. A key component of the new system is its emphasis on continuous improvement which has been incorporated into the accreditation standards. As a consequence, the new system requires a much greater level of involvement and commitment by providers than previously. In order to continue receiving government funding all facilities had to be accredited by January 1st 2001. This study represents an evaluation of the accreditation system based on the views and experiences of service providers in Western Australia. It explored a number of issues relating to the basic philosophy and principles underlying the new system, the implementation process, the accreditation standards that are used as a basis for assessing service quality and the overall impact of the system on providers. It also sought providers' views about the strengths and limitations of the system and any areas in need of change or improvement. A descriptive design, using in-depth interviews as the method of data collection, was adopted for the study.
Year of publication: |
2003
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Authors: | Grenade, Linda Elise |
Publisher: |
Curtin University of Technology, School of Public Health. |
Subject: | management and evaluation of quality | aged care standards | Australian residential aged care |
Saved in:
freely available
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