Village gets clean bill of health

Peninsula Village Retirement Centre has been given a clean bill of health by the Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency.

Monitoring by the agency has found that the centre has rectified non-compliance issues identified late last year.

The agency's assessment team spent seven days on-site in October interviewing staff and residents and assessing sampled documents, following two allegations of sexual assault last October.

Following the review audit, the agency made a decision not to revoke the centre's accreditation.

The team's audit findings indicated that the centre did not comply at the time with two out of 42 expected outcomes of the Accreditation Standards in areas of regulatory compliance and human resource management.

The report stated that the Peninsula Village did not have a system in place to monitor and ensure ongoing compliance with relevant legislation.

"The assessment team identified through a review of relevant documentation and management and staff interviews that the home does not have a system to ensure that current criminal records checks are in place for all staff members," the report stated.

The team's findings also indicated the centre did not comply with human resource management where "there is appropriately skilled and qualified staff sufficient to ensure that services are delivered in accordance with these standards and the residential care service's philosophy and objectives".

According to the report, "the home lacks processes to ensure that services are delivered in accordance with the Accreditation Standards and the home's philosophy and objectives.

"While the home is currently providing mandatory education in elder abuse for all staff and 80 staff have attended the education in the past two weeks, staff have not reported suspected abuse of residents within a reasonable time on two occasions in September and October 2008," the report stated.

"There remain eight staff who were employed prior to 1 June 2007, who are working at the home and do not have a current criminal records check.

"There is one staff member who commenced employment at the home after 1 June, 2007, who started without a current criminal records check and still does not have a criminal records check and there are two staff members who continue to work although their national police certificates have expired.

"Having these staff working at the home is contrary to the home's policy and legislative requirements as they have not been assessed as suitable to work in aged care."

The agency has reported that monitoring since the audit has found that the standards are now being met.

The Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency is a body appointed by the Department of Health and Ageing to assess and manage services working towards accreditation.

Report, 9 Mar 2009 Aged Care Standards and Accreditation Agency Ltd