The Serious Incident Response Scheme (SIRS) aims to identify and prevent abuse and neglect among people receiving aged care.
It applies to providers of residential aged care and home services.
Home services include:
- home care packages
- Commonwealth Home Support Programme
- flexible care delivered in a home or community setting, including Multi-Purpose Services, Short Term Restorative Care and Transition Care Program
- National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Flexible Aged Care Program.
Reportable incidents
There are 8 types of reportable incidents under the SIRS.
|
Type of incident |
Examples |
|---|---|
|
Unreasonable use of force |
hitting pushing shoving rough handling |
|
Unlawful sexual contact or inappropriate sexual conduct |
sexual threats stalking sexual activities without consent |
|
Neglect |
withholding personal care untreated wounds insufficient assistance during meals |
|
Psychological or emotional abuse |
yelling name-calling ignoring making threatening gestures refusing access to care or services as a means of punishment |
|
Unexpected death |
The provider didn't take reasonable steps to prevent a death. A death results directly from something the provider did or didn’t do. |
|
Stealing or financial coercion by a staff member |
coercing someone to change their will stealing valuables |
|
Inappropriate use of restrictive practices |
using a restrictive practice without prior consent using a restrictive practice in a non-emergency situation issuing a drug to influence someone’s behaviour as a form of restrictive practice |
|
Unexplained absence from care |
Someone is absent from the service without explanation, and there are reasonable grounds to report the absence to the police. |
Non-reportable incidents
If an incident isn’t one of the 8 reportable incident types, you don't need to report it to us. You may still need to report it to someone else.
You must also manage all incidents in line with your Incident Management System.
More information and examples of reportable incidents
For more information, download the SIRS guidelines for aged care providers:
SIRS decision support tool
When reporting a SIRS incident, you must say whether it’s Priority 1 or 2.
Use our SIRS decision support tool to help you decide the priority level.
Report an incident
You must notify us of all reportable incidents, including:
- alleged or suspected incidents
- incidents involving people with cognitive or mental impairment, such as dementia.
Log in to the My Aged Care Service and Support portal to report an incident.
Provider responsibilities around reporting incidents
Aged care providers must:
- assign roles and responsibilities for reporting an incident
- train assigned staff to report an incident.
More information
We've created a suite of SIRS resources, including guides, fact sheets, videos and forms.
