No country (club) for old men - older men and community aged care an Australian perspective

Community aged care provides a range of practical, social, and personal care services to older people in their own homes. Recent Australian government aged care policies place great emphasis on community aged care as a way to both help older people remain in their own homes and, more strategically, as a more cost effective ways to deal with some of the pressures of population aging. Men make up some 45% of the Australian population over 65, yet only 35% of community aged care clients are males. Existing evidence from health and community services show that many services have cultural and structural barriers to men's full participation, yet no literature was identified which investigated potential barriers to men's participation specifically for community aged care. Surveys, interviews, and focus groups were conducted with service providers of Home and Community Care (HACC) services (a specific government funding stream for certain community care services). Older men currently receiving HACC services were interviewed, as were men eligible to receiving services but had elected not to. Barriers and enablers to men's participation were identified as well as examples of innovative approaches for engaging this population of men. This presentation will present some of the identified barriers to men's access to community aged care, as well as describing models of practice which overcome these barriers. Implications for policy and practice will be discussed, as will developments which have resulted from this research which have improved both information provision to older men and practices within HACC services.