Firstly, let me say that very few of us want to put our parents into an aged care home. And that’s what it feels like, doesn’t it? Our loved ones don’t put themselves into care. We put them into care. But unfortunately, in most cases, there is no choice.

Sometimes our elder will only need respite—short-term residential aged care to recover from an injury from a fall, for example, or an adverse reaction to medication—or simply to give the carer and the care team time to have a break for themselves.

But in the majority of situations, there simply comes a time when the health needs of our elders require 24/7 professional care. And no matter how willing and well-intentioned their village is, we just do not have the skills to continue to manage their increasingly complex healthcare needs.

And at the moment, healthcare packages do not extend to funding dying at home.

The most difficult aspect of going into residential aged care is not only the trauma and grief of leaving their home, but the fear of residential aged care itself. The findings of the Royal Commission into Aged Care included so many stories of callousness, cruelty, incompetence, abuse, neglect and a little light theft that we are all entitled to be edgy about wholly outsourcing our elders’ care.

And we all hope that these findings will bring some accountability to the sector, some minimum standards of humanity, honesty and bookkeeping. But meanwhile, the standard of care still varies greatly.

The most important thing we must do is to be informed about the aged care home we choose. We must know exactly what services they provide. We must know the level of specialist care they provide and who is providing it.

These services must include palliative care because most people go into residential aged care at the end of life.

We need to know what is going on between our visits and, if there is a problem, we need to know to whom to complain.

There are reputable residences available. We just need to know how to identify them.