Respite care is short term care for an older person that gives the person who usually cares for them a break. It can happen at home, at a day centre, overnight in a cottage, or in an aged care home for a few days or several weeks.
The aged care means test is an assessment of the older person’s income and assets by Services Australia. It decides how much they contribute towards their care, both at home under Support at Home and in an aged care home.
Support at Home is the Australian Government program that funds aged care at home. It replaced the Home Care Packages Program and Short-Term Restorative Care on 1 November 2025.
ACAT no longer exists under that name. Aged care assessments are now done by the Single Assessment Service, using a questionnaire and algorithm called the Integrated Assessment Tool, and the algorithm, not the assessor, decides the funding classification.
Your parent or friend needs residential aged care, and you are trying to make the right decision. But as you begin talking to different homes, each conversation seems to reveal another fee, making an already difficult process feel even more overwhelming.
When someone rings us at this point, we do not start with aged care. We start by asking whereabouts in the journey they are, because the answer changes everything that follows.
Respite care is short term care for an older person that gives the person who usually cares for them a break. It can happen at home, at a day centre, overnight in a cottage, or in an aged care home for a few days or several weeks.
The aged care means test is an assessment of the older person’s income and assets by Services Australia. It decides how much they contribute towards their care, both at home under Support at Home and in an aged care home.
Support at Home is the Australian Government program that funds aged care at home. It replaced the Home Care Packages Program and Short-Term Restorative Care on 1 November 2025.
ACAT no longer exists under that name. Aged care assessments are now done by the Single Assessment Service, using a questionnaire and algorithm called the Integrated Assessment Tool, and the algorithm, not the assessor, decides the funding classification.
Your parent or friend needs residential aged care, and you are trying to make the right decision. But as you begin talking to different homes, each conversation seems to reveal another fee, making an already difficult process feel even more overwhelming.
When someone rings us at this point, we do not start with aged care. We start by asking whereabouts in the journey they are, because the answer changes everything that follows.
