Quality in aged care

What does high quality aged care look like?

There are many factors that go into delivering high quality care. These include meeting regulatory and health care requirements and providing enough staff. High quality care is about listening to people, understanding them as individuals and delivering care in line with their needs and preferences. It’s about hearing and responding to feedback from the people receiving care, to ensure the best possible quality of life.

How can I check an aged care provider’s performance on quality?

You can use the Find a provider tool to find service providers in your area that are regulated by the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. This means they need to meet the Aged Care Quality Standards and other legal requirements.

If you’re looking at a Home Care Package or an aged care home, you’ll find some extra information to help you understand how they are performing. 

• For Home Care Package providers: You can check whether they are meeting compliance requirements in the Compliance section of their profile. 
• For aged care homes: You can quickly understand and compare the quality of care provided at aged care homes using the Australian Government’s Star Ratings. Star Ratings provide a rating for homes against set criteria to make them easy to compare.

Star Ratings in aged care homes

The Australian Government assesses the quality of care at all government-funded aged care homes. Based on these assessments, each home receives a Star Rating as a simple way of showing information about the quality of care they provide and how they compare to others.

Star Ratings were introduced in December 2022. Aged care homes receive a rating between 1 and 5 stars to indicate the quality of care across 4 key areas of performance. Outcomes in these 4 subcategories inform an overall Star Rating.

The 4 key areas are:

What do the Star Ratings mean?

When you use the Find a provider tool to check an aged care home’s Star Rating, you’ll see an Overall Star Rating between 1 and 5 stars. More stars means an aged care home is delivering higher quality care across the four key areas of performance. 

The table below displays the different rating levels and the number of homes nationwide that have received each rating.

Overall Star Rating		What percentage of homes in Australia currently have this rating? *
	Excellent	3%
	Good	70%
	Acceptable	26%
	Improvement needed	0%
	Significant improvement needed	0%

* Percentages may not equal 100% due to rounding.

For more information you can download Star Ratings fact sheet. We have also translated this fact sheet into 18 languages, which you can find by selecting your preferred language on our Accessible for all page.

What if I can’t see a rating?

There are a number of reasons why a provider may display a ’No rating’ label. This may be because the aged care home:

• is a new provider
• is operating under new ownership
• has recently reopened after major repairs or renovations
• is experiencing technical (data or IT) issues
• has received a temporary exemption due to significant health or weather-related circumstances
• reported their data late or chose not to provide the data needed. These providers have not been granted an exemption, or
• chose not to participate in the annual Residents’ Experience Survey. These providers have not been granted an exemption.

For new providers, new ownership, or recent reopening, data and ratings will appear in the subcategory areas from about 6 months. The Overall Star Rating is displayed at 12 months once data across all four subcategories has been collected.

There are some exceptions in the display of ratings and data in some of the subcategories:

• Compliance: If a provider receives a specific formal regulatory notice before their 12-month assessment, their Compliance Rating will be updated immediately.
• Residents' Experience: If a provider cares for a small number of residents, the Resident Experience Survey data may reveal their identities. In this case, a Residents' Experience rating will be displayed, but not the survey data.
   

What if I'm not happy with the quality of care?

You have the right to receive high quality care and services, and to always be treated with respect and dignity. This is part of the Charter of Aged Care Rights.

If you have concerns about the quality of care that you or your loved one is receiving, a good first step is to talk to your provider about it. If you need help with talking to your provider an advocate may be able to help you. Learn more on our Advocacy page or visit the Older Persons Advocacy Network website. 

If you don’t feel comfortable talking to your provider, or you have spoken to them and your concern has not been resolved, you can make a complaint to the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. If you wish, your complaint can be confidential or anonymous. They can help you resolve your concern with the service provider and can take regulatory action where needed.