If you have a Serious Incident Response Scheme (SIRS) enquiry, you can:
- Call us for free on 1800 081 549 between 9:00 am and 5:00 pm AEST seven days a week
- email us at sirs@agedcarequality.gov.au.
This page includes links to resources to help aged care providers meet their incident management responsibilities. If you are an aged care consumer and would like information about the Serious Incident Response Scheme (SIRS), visit the SIRS consumer resources page.
All approved providers of Commonwealth-funded aged care have responsibilities regarding incident management, including as set out:
- in the Aged Care Act 1997 and Part 4B of the Quality of Care Principles 2014
- under Requirement 3(d)(iv) of Standard 8 of the Aged Care Quality Standards for ‘managing and preventing incidents, including the use of an incident management system’
- under Requirement (3)(c) of Standard 6 of the Quality Standards to demonstrate that ‘an open disclosure process is used when things go wrong’
- in the Charter of Aged Care Rights.
Service providers of the Commonwealth Home Support Programme (CHSP) and the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Flexible Aged Care Program (NATSIFACP) services have similar responsibilities as set out in Commonwealth grant agreements.
Guidance documents
- Effective incident management systems: Best practice guidance
- Reporting serious incidents: Using a problem solving approach to enhance effective incident management
- Effective serious incident investigations guidance for providers
- Effective incident management system checklist
Fact sheets
- What is an effective incident management system?
- Recording incidents in an incident management system
Frequently asked questions
Articles
The following articles from our Aged Care Quality Bulletin newsletter address each of the 6 essential elements of an effective incident management system (IMS):
- Ensure leadership and a safety culture (Quality Bulletin, February 2022)
- Responding to incidents (Quality Bulletin, March 2022)
- Record and report the incident (Quality Bulletin, April 2022)
- Analyse the incident (Quality Bulletin, May 2022)
- Implement actions (Quality Bulletin, June 2022)
- Close the loop (Quality Bulletin, July 2022)
Online learning tools
Posters
Videos
Webinars
- SIRS for residential aged care: Incident management systems (11 March 2021)
- Introduction to the SIRS for home services: Incident management systems (26 September 2022)
Workshops
You can find all the SIRS resources on our dedicated SIRS provider resources page.
