Centre for Cultural Diversity in Ageing Newsletter

The Aged & Community Care Providers Association (ACCPA) will run their Online Cultural Care Forum in partnership with The Centre for Cultural Diversity in Ageing. This exciting online event will touch on wellbeing of a culturally diverse workforce, preventing racism in aged care, culturally appropriate care resources and free translations. Dont miss this opportunity to hear from the experts in the field, and register here

The Centre worked on a submission to shape the new Aged Care Act. We continue our advocacy work ensuring that the Act considers the needs of people from diverse cultural, linguistic, and spiritual backgrounds. This effort aims to maintain Australia's reputation as a leader in providing culturally sensitive aged care. Please have a look to the submission: A New Model for Regulating Aged Care: The Foundations - Consultation Paper No 2

This resource was developed after having received feedback from residential aged care providers of the need to capture the cultural, linguistic and spiritual care needs of their clients in a holistic manner in one document. 

The Centre has wide range of resources, including multilingual resources, practice guides and many more. Find them here

Monica O'Dwyer, researcher from the Centre for Occupational and Environmental Health at the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine from Monash University; joined Tabitha Porter, from Benetas; Meg Polacsek from the Australian Association of Gerontology and The Centre's Nikolaus Rittinghausen and Lisa Tribuzio; in the development of this exciting project. One of the important findings are that there is considerable cultural and linguistic diversity in aged care, with more than 20 per cent of residents from a Non-Main English Speaking Country with a preferred language other than English living in a facility where they are the only resident with that language. Understanding this diversity and the risk of linguistic isolation of people living in residential aged care is essential to person-centred care. For more information, please access the research paper here.

The recordings and presentations can be accessed on our website.

 
2. PICAC NSW & ACT offers a series of FREE online cultural micro-courses, which are available to all aged care providers. They provide practical information and tools to make your services culturally inclusive for older people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and meet the requirements of the Aged Care Quality Standards. Recently they launched the micro-course Working with New and Emerging Communities, which covers these important topics:  

Module 1: Identify the demographics of new and emerging communities in Australia and understand the unique challenges faced by individuals from diverse backgrounds

Module 2: The profound effects of trauma when accessing care, strategies for effective engagement with new and emerging communities, and how to improve staff cultural sensitivity 

Module 3: Valuable resources are available to service providers for effective outreach

Enrol FREE in this micro-course here

3. Council on the Ageing NT (PICAC NT) developed an Aged care contract checklist in 14 languages for supporting clients before signing a contract with a Home Care service provider.

Nearly 40% of Australia’s aged care workforce, especially frontline staff, come from a culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) background. While they care for an increasingly diverse older population, experiencing racism at work – from older people, their families, and other staff – is unfortunately all too common. Instances of racial abuse are often based on skin colour or accent, with incidents typically unreported due to fears of retribution and job loss. Instead, staff tolerate as much as they can and eventually leave.

High staff-turnover and racial vilification are not conducive to high-quality care. Combatting racism in aged care is critical, necessitating not just training but cultural shifts and recognition of the unique contributions CALD aged care workers can offer. Acknowledging these contributions can improve staff retention and person-centred care, crucial for promoting a fair and safe workplace for all.

The National Ageing Research Institute (NARI) runs workshops on addressing racism in aged care designed to equip staff and organisations with pragmatic tools and techniques to address this problem. To find out more get in touch with us at education@nari.edu.au