Updated as of 27 July 2007

The project is being undertaken to ensure that older people in central Auckland have access to the right type of healthcare, at the right time and in the right setting. To achieve this, our current systems are being examined against four key objectives, which the Board have agreed form the vision of the service that we want. These are streamlined access to care, home based support based on identified goals of the service user, flexible funding to achieve these goals and standard and uniform assessment of needs.

At this stage it is unknown, but given that streamlined assessment and restorative homecare are two of the overarching project objectives, these will certainly be examined as part of the review. Other services may be affected in order for the project vision to be realised, but this will depend on the project managers recommendations, and on the decision made by the board of which model to move to (if any).

Answer: The information gathering, analysis and consultation is scheduled to all be finished by about October of this year, with recommendations for improvement scheduled to be presented to the Board immediately thereafter. Any changes to services will begin to be rolled out in January 2008, with a phased approach to implementation expected to occur throughout 2008.

Answer: Yes. Virtually every DHB is at some stage in a very similar process. This is due to a need to align to national direction around providing more restorative, strengths based home support services, and to ensure that older people are being offered the option to ‘age in place’ should they choose to do so.

Answer: The first people should be directed to the website, which can be reached via the intranet or ADHB website home page. All documents pertaining to the project are posted on this site. If questions still remain then the Project Manager Jenny Chong should be contacted on (09) 6309943 ext 4002 or Mobile: 0212427886

Answer: All staff will certainly have ample opportunity to contribute to the project, and will be accommodated in various ways including both group and individual forums. Stakeholders in terms of community providers will be given the same opportunity and forums have been scheduled to consult with this group. The general public will not be consulted until the proposed design is known, and at this point it will depend on the level of service change (if any) as to what level of further consultation is undertaken (remembering that service users and the general public had ample opportunity to feed into the base Healthy Ageing 2020 Strategy from which this project has evolved)

Answer: there is a dual process being adopted, whereby the Project Manager is spending an extended amount of time immersed in the day to day workings of our services – both secondary and community. Parallel to this process a working group comprising the following representatives are meeting weekly to inform and steer the project