Residents left in soiled pads for hours as staff lift lid on Australia’s aged care staffing crisis

Shocking findings have emerged after aged care workers revealed they are being forced to take on duties outside of their role, leaving residents neglected. Read what staff are saying.

EXCLUSIVE: Aged care workers have lifted the lid on the staffing crisis inside Australia’s homes, revealing how some residents are being left in soiled pads for more than eight hours.

An exclusive report reveals that more than eight out of 10 workers who rated the staffing levels in their own residential facilities gave just one or two stars out of five. The average rating from 1000 workers was 1.8 stars.

The views of staff were collected between April and June from Aged Care Watch, a portal which allows staff, residents and families to submit reports on their experiences.

One personal care worker from South Australia wrote on the site how on one day “poor residents” were not attended to until after 3pm, leaving them in soiled pads for more than eight hours.

“We are literally neglecting our residents,” she wrote.

More than eight out of 10 workers who rated the staffing levels in their own residential facilities gave just one or two stars out of five.

The ratings by workers differs sharply from the self reporting of staffing levels made by aged care providers, where the average is three stars, which is deemed “acceptable”.

Residents should be getting on average 215 minutes-a-day of care in targets set by the Federal Government, as part of a key reform recommended by the Aged Care Royal Commission to address neglect.

Aged care worker Suzana Jones has been in the sector for 31 years and said in her role as a union delegate, employees have been telling her that providers are “fudging” the figures.

“Staff are increasingly being asked to take on duties outside of their role as direct care workers,” Ms Jones said.

“They’re telling me they’re being asked to do cleaning, laundry, wash the dishes, mop floors, which has got nothing to do with direct care work, yet those minutes are counted as part of their direct-care shift.”

She said some care workers have been retitled as multiskilled workers, with their responsibilities including cooking and cleaning.

She said staff are astonished to see how well their facilities are scoring in the government’s star ratings when they are severely understaffed.

“They want to know how providers are getting away with this because what it says on paper is not what is actually happening on the floor,” Ms Jones said.

Aged care worker Suzana Jones has been in the sector for 31 years and says in her role as a union delegate, employees have been telling her that providers are fudging the figures. Picture Mark Brake

Catalina Gonzalez, Aged Care Director for the United Workers Union, which set up Aged Care Watch, as a transparency tool, said “providers must be held accountable for delivering the care-time aged care residents need”.

The report also found 610 respondents indicated residents were not receiving their minimum level of care time.

Only 202 workers indicated residents said they did.

Around half of Registered Nurses, Enrolled Nurses and personal care workers, said they were required to do non-direct care work.

A spokeswoman for the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing said older Australians are receiving an extra 6.8 million minutes of care every single day thanks to the Albanese Government’s reforms.

She the department checks the reported care minutes by comparing reported hours to payroll records, timesheets and duty statements.

For the first time, at the end of this new financial year providers will also be required to undergo an external audit over their care minute reporting.

Originally published as Residents left in soiled pads for hours as staff lift lid on Australia’s aged care staffing crisis