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Aged care workers stressed about flood of paperwork: study

Staff in nursing homes worry they are spending too much time filling in forms when residents need care.

Aged care staff say too much paperwork is stopping them from doing their jobs properly. Picture: iStock
Aged care staff say too much paperwork is stopping them from doing their jobs properly. Picture: iStock

Workers in nursing homes are not only struggling with life in the time of COVID-19, they are also increasingly stressed about greater levels of paperwork that is eating into the time they can spend with residents.

A new study finds 78 per cent of aged-care managers reporting increased stress over the past 12 months since the introduction of new Aged Care Quality ­Standards. More than nine in 10 say a greater level of paperwork required by the standards is reducing face-to-face care of the nursing home population, the report by aged-care specialists CompliSpace finds.

“The aged-care sector is under intense stress as aged-care staff endure more work in trying to meet the regulatory requirements, without further support or funding from the gov­ernment,” CompliSpace chief executive David Griffiths said.

“Our study found the administrative burden of the new regulations may be adding strain to the sector, putting staff retention at risk and pointing to reduced capacity to care for residents.

“The eight new Aged Care Quality Standards replaced four previous benchmarks. While they were necessary, we believe the unintended impacts have not been fully assessed,” he said.

There are more than 240,000 nursing home residents in Australia. The average length of stay is about 2½ years, and care requirements are increasing with the higher acuity. More than 250 aged-care service providers provided input into the report.

Most said they had to change procedures around staff training because of the new standards, which had increased workloads without extra funding.

Read related topics:Aged CareCoronavirus

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Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/aged-care-workers-stressed-about-flood-of-paperwork-study/news-story/6780e0eea71dc232ca6b6bf52199947c