DELAYS in processing financial assessments by Centrelink are holding up seniors from moving into essential permanent care at facilities like Eventide Homes in Stawell.
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As of July 1, as part of the national aged care reforms, individuals must undergo an income and assets assessment provided by Centrelink before they move into permanent aged care.
Previously, an asset assessment provided by Centrelink was required, but assessments were only taking on average up to 14 days to receive once submitted.
Leading Aged Services Australia (LASA) has revealed that nearly 400 elderly Victorians have been denied residential care since July 1 due to critical system failures at Centrelink.
In addition, about 80 percent of aged care facilities had not seen a completed Centrelink form since the changes were introduced.
Eventide Homes Chief Executive Officer, Sue Blakey said the information delays were making it difficult for her staff to calculate individual care fees and for families to determine their contribution.
"Quality aged care is already in demand across our region, so these hold ups are causing stress on families and aged care service providers like Eventide," she said.
"We want to help permanent residency applicants get the care they need now, so we're placing them into our government funded respite care."
Ms Blakey said there were currently 16 people on respite at Eventide who were waiting to go into permanent care.
Six had already used their allocation of 63 days per year and applications had recently been approved to give them a further three weeks of funded respite.
"This situation is going to have an impact on future respite until the end of June next year and potentially reduce our respite from nine to seven beds," Ms Blakey said.
"Funding for respite care is significantly lower than potential income from permanency as no accommodation payment is made for respite."
Ms Blakey said LASA had reported increasing pressure on the public health system due to the Centrelink holdups.
"LASA is saying that if hospitals can't discharge elderly patients into residential care, they remain in hospital, which begins to create a problem of 'bed blocking'," she said.
"We hope that discussions between LASA and the Federal Government can result in a solution to this problem soon."