Disability representative organisation People with Disability Australia has found people with disability are struggling to work out if they are eligible for COVID-19 vaccines and are getting extremely inconsistent access to vaccination appointments.
Three months into the vaccine rollout and fewer than 1,000 residents in disability support homes have been protected against COVID-19. The vaccination rate of less than five per cent has been branded an abject failure by the Disability Royal Commission.
Guest: Bill Shorten, Shadow Minister for Government Services and the NDIS
And while the positive impacts are widespread across specific patient groups, it has been particularly beneficial for vulnerable populations, such as those accessing the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
I spoke not in my capacity as President of People with Disability Australia, nor as a board member on any of the other boards that I sit on. I spoke as a disabled woman and a carer who, like many of us, has spent a lifetime battling disability and mainstream services and systems.
In juvenile detention facilities and in adult prisons right across Australia, the incarcerated are excluded from Medicare and denied the same level of healthcare as the rest of us. They are denied the PBS. They are also denied the opportunity to access the NDIS. Think about this — our Federal Government denies Medicare to gaoled children as young as ten-year-olds.
This report finds that Victoria’s mental health system operates in crisis mode, has “catastrophically failed to live up to expectations” and must be rebuilt. Demand has now overtaken the capacity of the system. Among the final report’s 65 recommendations, outlined in a mammoth five-volume report, are the phasing out of seclusion and restraints treatments over the next decade, and making compulsory treatments an option of last resort.
Jo Abi fears what will happen to her two autistic teenage sons when she is no longer around to communicate when they need health care, she told the Disability Royal Commission on Tuesday.
This free website is set up to provide information, tools and training resources to ensure that people with significant disabilities can confidently choose the allied health services needed to improve their skills and independence over time. It also offers a range of resources for allied health professionals working in the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
Complex trauma-related dissociation underlies diverse presentations to health professionals and is often not detected. This means that many people do not receive appropriate responses and care. These Practice Guidelines for Identifying and Treating Complex Trauma-related Dissociation are for clinicians who work in a range of roles, come from different disciplines and have received diverse training but who want to enhance their ability to recognise and work with people experiencing complex trauma-related dissociation.
Ongoing college advocacy for GPs to be involved in the planning, implementation and unending support for their patients accessing the NDIS has been recognised by the committee, with the report recommending that the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) investigate ways in which each participant’s plan could be shared – with their consent – with their GP.
Allied health professionals play an important role in delivering the NDIS. The framework develops the skills and knowledge of allied health professionals to better provide high-quality, person-centred support that promotes choice and control for people with disability and complex support needs.
The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) is designed to help people living with a significant and permanent disability live their best life. GPs play a very important role in helping patients to determine potential eligibility by gathering the crucial information that provides the evidence base required to access supports through the Scheme. This co-designed suite of resources guides GPs in supporting their patients through the NDIS, or more easily identify if patients could be eligible to benefit from the Scheme.
Young people often end up in aged care because they fall through the gap between hospitals and the disability service system. The two systems operate on completely different time frames. For example, if a young person has a very severe brain injury, as soon as they are medically stable there is pressure to move them out of a hospital bed. But disability services take weeks or months to determine if a suitable housing and support option is available.
Closing date: October 1, 2025
The initiative includes $10.6m in the 2020-21 Budget for a national network of system coordinators to help younger people find age-appropriate accommodation and supports to allow them to live independently in the community. The Australian Government is committed to ensuring no younger person (under the age of 65) lives in residential aged care unless there are exceptional circumstances.
“We believe that if Oliver had not have had the labels of autism and intellectual disability attached to him, he would absolutely have not have been prescribed psychotropic medications,” McGowan said.