South Coast High Level Care Respite Service

This service caters for the needs of carers who are caring for a frail aged person who presents with a high level of care needs or whose needs have increased. Individual care plans are designed in conjunction with the carer and care recipient. This service is available for carers in the Illawarra and Shoalhaven areas.

This service can provide:

1. Centre Based Respite: Staff will provide additional support to care recipients in a centre based setting to enable the person to continue to attend a day care group.

2. Home Based Respite: Limit of 16 hours per carer per month. Services include transport, social support, companionship, personal care and meal preparation.

3. Mobile Respite: Access to existing mobile services in the Illawarra and Shoalhaven with additional support.

4. Short Term Respite: Utilising the Respite House for periods of overnight respite (26hrs) in situations when the carer requests to stay at home to rest but needs to place the care recipient in care but is unable to find available residential respite or is unable to place the person into residential care due to other reasons. Short term respite will also be offered in emergencies.

All the above services are currently operating but are not able to be accessed by clients with high needs due to a lack of resources to support them. This model aims at providing integration into these programs by clients with high needs, with additional support for their safety and wellbeing. This will involve staff assisting one on one.

Respite will be available 52 weeks of the year with the exception of the day care and mobile services, which operate 48 weeks of the year.

Staff are available 52 weeks of the year, seven days a week, to be rostered for in-home and emergency respite.

For more information, please contact Jo or Michelle at the Bomaderry Outreach Office (BOO).