Page 1850 - Week 09 - Thursday, 19 October 1989
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The committee also found that there was a pressing need for a hospice for the terminally ill designed to provide palliative rather than curative care. The report urges that the hospice be physically separate from acute care wards.
Dementia was one of the health issues the committee was specifically asked to examine. We are distressed to learn of the growing prevalence of dementia, in keeping with the increasing age of our population. Dementia sufferers have particular needs and require a special kind of care which is not easily accommodated beside the care provided to non-dementia patients in hostels and nursing homes. The committee has therefore recommended that dementia-specific units be developed to provide specialist care for sufferers.
The committee emphasised the need for integration and coordination of the services for the ageing, recognising the vital role played by the rehabilitation and aged care service and the academic unit at Woden Valley Hospital. Because our ageing population is growing at such a rate, we emphasised the importance of constant monitoring of the situation. It is changing, and we have to keep ahead of it.
Most of all, the committee was deeply impressed by the care that is already given to the ageing in the community. Throughout the range of services which the committee examined, it found that people were providing support and care which went beyond the limits of their specific tasks. The ACT community is extremely fortunate that this is so. It is appropriate to mention the work undertaken by the Australian Council on the Ageing. The council plays an important role in identifying the needs of the ageing and ensuring that they are provided for. The council works closely with both government and voluntary service providers. We appreciated its advice to us. Because it is so close to the aged, its advice has been invaluable.
The community looked to our committee, and now the committee in turn looks to this Assembly and then to the Government to implement our report. I believe this report provides a sound basis to improve our services and our respect for the aged. We look to the administrative and financial support to enable us to implement our recommendations. We look to share with the Government and the parliament the important task of caring for the aged.
MRS NOLAN (10.44): Mr Speaker, as deputy chairman of the Social Policy Committee I, like Mr Wood, am very proud of and pleased with the committee's first report on the needs of the ageing inquiry. I am particularly pleased to have been associated with this report as the inquiry was a Liberal Party initiative and part of the Liberal Party's policy platform for the 4 March election.
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