Assessment process

We're responsible for several regulatory functions. These include:

accreditation of residential aged care services
quality reviews of home services and National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander program services
monitoring the quality of both aged care residential and home services.

These processes help ensure that care and services align with the Aged Care Quality Standards (Quality Standards).

Assessment contacts

Assessment contacts help monitor the quality of care and services aged care providers give. We conduct them to assess the performance of services against the Quality Standards. We also conduct them to monitor the quality of a particular service.

As well we determine:

when the assessment contact will be conducted
the purpose of the assessment contact.

For more information about our processes and assessment responsibilities, read our Regulatory Bulletin.

National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Flexible Aged Care Program services have assessment contacts under the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Flexible Aged Care Program guidelines.

Documents for performance assessments

Performance assessment at a residential service begins with an entry meeting. These meetings are between the person in charge of the service and the Assessment Team.

During this meeting, the Assessment Team will ask for key documents from the person in charge.

Our Information for providers guide covers the essential documents that the Assessment Team will ask for at the start of:

the performance assessment for site audits
review audits
some assessment contacts where performance against the Quality Standards is being assessed.

Providers can give these documents to the Assessment Team during the entry meeting. If they don't have them at the entry meeting, they must make them available an hour later.

The Assessment Team will also request other relevant documents throughout the performance assessment.

How documents help the Assessment Team

The person in charge of the service will likely have access to the critical documents at any time. Being aware of the expectation to produce key documents will help them:

prepare for a performance assessment
discuss with service management how these documents will be produced on request.

When providers make these documents available to the Assessment Team, it helps:

with their time on site
support an efficient and effective performance assessment
identify people receiving aged care and staff to speak with
understand your service.

Risk-based questions

We've developed a set of standard risk-based questions to be asked at the start of a performance assessment. Quality Assessors ask the person in charge these questions in the entry meeting.

These questions include both critical areas of risk and Commission priorities.

The focus of these questions is based on:

areas identified from previous assessments
Quality Standards requirements that cause concern or are often not met across the sector
risk-based industry alerts that may form part of our current strategy.

Residential services questions

Have there been any adverse findings by another regulatory agency or oversight body in the last 12 months? (For example, Health Care Complaints Commission or similar, a food safety authority, or WorkCover.)
What trends do your complaints data show you?
How many people receiving aged care have pressure injuries?
Have there been any medication incidents in the past 6 months where a person receiving aged care required hospitalisation or attention by a medical officer?
How many people receiving aged care have had falls and required medical attention in the past 3 months?
How many people at the service are currently subject to restrictive practices? (Prompt for a separate answer to chemical restraints, mechanical restraints, environmental restraints, physical restraints and seclusion.)
Have there been any incidents (past 6 months) where a person receiving aged care or a staff member required medical attention and/or psychological treatment due to challenging behaviour from another person receiving aged care?
What action has the service taken to assess and minimise infection-related risks for the care of people receiving aged care, including the impact of a potential COVID-19 outbreak?

Home services questions

Have there been any adverse findings by another regulatory agency or oversight body in the last 12 months? (For example, Health Care Complaints Commission or similar, a food safety authority, or WorkCover.)
What trends do your complaints data show you?
Has the service had unfilled shifts in the last month?
Does the service have specific strategies to help staff provide care to people with dementia? If so, what are these?
Does the service have a process to identify and respond to changes in the condition of people receiving aged care? If so, what are these?
What action has the service taken to assess and minimise infection-related risks for the care of people receiving aged care, including the impact of a potential COVID-19 outbreak?