Around one in five older Australians are socially isolated. This rises to a third of older people living in residential aged care, and this topic has been nominated by the aged care sector as a priority concern.
In 2020, Swinburne University researchers Jane Farmer and Jasmine Knox worked with Uniting (NSW & ACT), The Salvation Army, and the University of Melbourne on a pilot project, and found that resident social isolation had become a pressing organisation issue they had to address.
With a vision to embed this social connection tool into existing care pathways, they sought the help of Aged Care Research and Industry Innovation Australia (ARIIA) to workshop the design and implementation of a social connection assessment toolkit they had developed.
The Social Connection Assessment and Enablement Toolkit features an e-learning module and digital data collection interface to better assess what residents want, when, for how long, and with whom they want to complete individual activities with.
The team from ARIIA’s Aged Care Partnering Program facilitated a workshop to provide a different perspective to the project and enabled participants to assess the current trends, capacity of staff, and foster collaboration, change readiness levels, spark innovation and contribute creatively to idea generation.
They were successful in receiving an ARIIA Grant in 2023 to complete the co-design of their project with residents and aged care workers to redefine the social connection tool and the content for the social connection e-learning module for aged care staff.
Based on pilot findings, outcomes of improved rapport, control and voice are anticipated for clients, with positive impacts on wellbeing.
They are in the process of finalising the co-designed, context-specific and evidence-based toolkit and creating an online version for staff to use with an iPad, then implementing and testing it with 100 residents, 36 staff and 4 Uniting and Salvation Army settings.
By using the toolkit aged care workers will be empowered to have consistent, meaningful conversations with clients about social connection needs while learning how to incorporate these into daily work.
Jane says she is very grateful to have been given this opportunity to develop and test the Social Connection Assessment and Enablement Toolkit on a larger cohort of people.
Achievements
“It has meant we have been able to assess and evaluate its effectiveness to pro-actively support older Australian’s social and emotional wellbeing in residential aged care.”
The team is eagerly looking forward to embedding this tool into current care pathways and data collection, to link clients with social contacts, activities, and places they enjoy.
They see this as a door to greater social engagement for residents, meaning less social isolation, and a positive impact on residents’ mental health and wellbeing. Once the project is completed in April 2024, the longer-term vision is for the Social Connection Assessment and Enablement Toolkit to be open access for the benefit of the aged care sector, with only a small licencing fee to keep it updated.