The Care Finder program is a free service that supports older people who experience multiple barriers to find and connect with aged care and community services in their local area.
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Care finders can meet you person to help you understand available aged care and community services and which ones are suitable for you. They can help with accessing services for the first time, changing services, or finding new supports.
They can help with:
- talking to My Aged Care on someone’s behalf and arranging an assessment
- attending and providing support at the assessment
- finding and shortlisting aged care providers
- completing forms and understanding aged care service agreements
- checking-in once services are up and running to make sure everything is OK
- solving other challenges and connecting you to supports in the community such as health, mental health, housing and homelessness, drug and alcohol services, and community groups.
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The Care Finder program is designed to support older people who need intensive face-to-face support to access aged care and community services, but who do not have a support person, family member or friend to help them.
To access the Care Finder program, an individual will likely:
- be eligible for government-funded aged care*
- not have a carer or support person who can help them
- not have a carer or support person who they feel comfortable with or trust to support them.
In addition, the person may likely have one or more of the following:
- be experiencing isolation.
- have difficulty communicating because of language or literacy problems.
- find it hard to understand information or make decisions.
- be reluctant to engage with aged care or government funded services.
- remain in an unsafe situation if services are not received.
* To be eligible for government-funded aged care, an individual will need help with one or more everyday tasks and be:
- 65 years or older (50 years or older for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people) OR
- 50 years or older (45 years or older for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people) on a low income; are homeless/at risk of being homeless; determined by the Care Finder agency to be ‘frail’ or ‘prematurely aged’ (defined as having a functional need for assistance with one or more basic or instrumental activities of daily living)
- have one or more reasons for requiring intensive support to interact with My Aged Care, access aged care services and/or other relevant supports in the community.
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You can find out about accessing the program by calling any Care Finder organisation in your local area. You or someone you trust can make this call, however, it is best if you are together when the call is made.
There are 12 local providers who support 22 local government areas in the Murray PHN region. Download a flyer to find one near you: -
- My Aged Care to discuss needs and arrange an assessment:
- Call 1800 200 244 8am-8pm Monday to Friday and 10am-4pm Saturday
- visit myagedcare.gov.au
- Visit any of the 70 Services Australia centre for face-to-face help, Services Australia website or call 1800 227 475 8am-5pm Monday to Friday for their locations
- My Aged Care – Support for older Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people
- National Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisation – Trusted Indigenous Facilitators
- Help from a care finder: My Aged Care
- Older Persons Advocacy Network (OPAN) or phone 1800 700 600 8am-8pm Monday to Friday and 10am-4pm Saturday
- Carer Gateway or call 1800 422 737 8am-5pm Monday to Friday
- Dementia Australia or call 1800 100 500, 24 hours a day/seven days a week
- My Aged Care to discuss needs and arrange an assessment:
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