HomeFirst – INDIVIDUALISED SUPPORT PACKAGE.
PERSONAL APPROACH BY MELINDA SMITH.


My support package started in February 1997 with I H A S. Now, it is called Homefirst. I was still living at home with my parents. But, 4 months later, I was able to move out on my own. I moved into a two bedroom unit, in the eastern suburbs. Close to my family and close to my supportive community.  

Until this point. My mum had been my primary care giver. However I had received some support from the local council, for some occasional support when my parents went away for weekends and for cleaning my bed sitter. Even though this service was a good starting point to get me use to having different people support me, it did not have a lot of flexibility and it would have been expensive to use too often. 

My life changed in February 1997.  The home first support started, while I was still living with my parents. This was good because, it gave me two months to get used to having support workers come in each day,. before moving out to a place on my own. Mum and I had to do a lot of adjusting. We did not need each other as much. At the same time, my mum was very supportive in the idea of my moving forward, and seeking support in other ways. We had often talked about what will happen to me when she and dad got too old. 

I was excited about my new freedom., to be able to have more control and not have to rely on family members for my personal support. But in other ways it was like an invasion of privacy. I had to communicate with a lot more people about my personal space. That was very difficult for me. My case manager from the housing resource support service, was very good in the way she supported me to adjust. 

I did not know about any home first case manager at the time. All communications was between housing resource support service and my nominated,  attendant care agency.  It was the case manager from H R S S who supported me directly. She  attended meetings and interviews with me. She helped me believe I could do it, make it work well for me. The case manager at H R S S supported me to choose an attendant care agency. Our plan was to interview five managers from different provider agencies. The process, although it was very slow process and a lot of work for me to, get the questions together and organize the interviews. It was very worthwhile and it did give me a lot of control, over what I wanted.

Initially, I wanted H R S S to be my broker. From there, I chose an attendant care agency to provide my support staff team.

The few months of having support workers every day,  did take me a lot of organizing, to work out what to do in each shift. I had to spend a lot of time communicating. with the agency co-ordinator and having input into the type of people, I wanted on my team. When I moved out, there was a good workable team in place. 


I could move onto the next step. Adjusting to the new environment and new lifestyle in general. 1997 was a big year for me.

It was not all a bed of roses. I had some great support workers. who knew the job well and we communicated very well. But I had some very irresponsible, and difficult support workers who should never have been in the field. Some of these were people that failed to turn up on time, some did not even turn up at all. I had some people who had no disability awareness training, and would treat me as if I were their child, who needed to be told what to do and what to wear. I had a one support worker who suffered from mental illness, which did put me in a very vulnerable position at one point. It is not just the support workers either. 

There have been difficult co-ordinators too. Unless you have a good rapport with the service provider or attendant care agency, things can go very wrong very quickly. My example of this is, when co-ordinators are not good at their job, it is very easy for hours to be wrongly calculated. I would end up getting less hours than, my entitlement. Also when the co-ordinator. does not take the time to understand me as a person and what my specific needs and expectations are. this can make it very difficult for me when I meet new potential support workers.

In the early stages of my home first support. I welcomed co-ordinators to come and meet me face to face. We would spend time developing the  careplan. For me I wanted to have a lot of input. 

It was important to me and still is that way. To be able to meet and greet every person before they are employed to work with me. It is something I have always done and something I will always do.  I expect my service provider, to recruit the support worker, interview them and then if they are potentially compatible. Then, I will meet the support worker. 

When the support worker is ready to start, I like to do a shadow shift with them. This means they come and work with one of my regular support workers for one shift. I use my regular support workers as the trainers. It not only makes my regular support workers feel valued and appreciated, but it also assists me enormously by speeding up the communication process. 

They need to be able to know what to do at both times. My routine is entirely different in the morning than the evening.

It is nearly eleven years since my home first support began. I have changed agencies and service providers only once. The change was because I wanted only one service support to think about. One really positive aspect of the home first support, I have been able to grow and get more out of life. Being able to manage and run my home with success inspired me to apply for a part time job. I have been working in a regular job since 1998.

One of the difficult and challenging aspects about managing my home first is, it can be like having a second job and that job can be seven days a week. Even though I have a reasonably good service provider, I am not as happy as I would like to be sometimes. I think service providers have slipped backwards, in the quality of carers that are coming in, and the changes in co-ordinating staff is just constantly rotating.

Building a good team is about negotiating and being as flexible as possible.  I have thirty four hours per week and while that sounds a lot of support hours. It can actually be very limiting for a person with high support needs. I have to be extremely well organized and always thinking and planning one day ahead. Most of my regular shifts are two hours at one time. In the two hours I must account for my complex communication needs. It takes me longer to say what I want to say. The fact, I take a long time to eat a meal and sometimes there are choking sessions to account for. 

I aim to use my hours as effectively as I can at all time. I like to accrue one or two hours every week for emergencies and holidays. I know home first support does allow people to use hours for outside the home, but for me it is my personal support at home that must come first. Holidays are very important to me too. 

My frustrations are sometimes I have to wait for my next support worker to come. I have dropped my lunch on the floor and the dog has eaten it. Most of my hours are used for early morning and for the early evening. 

These frustrations led me to be part of a proactive project. with my friend Susan Whiting. Susan has cerebral palsy like myself, and lives independently in a unit with the her home first support. We have been thinking and planning our future for some time now. Our goal and dream is to be able to live closer together, preferring to be a property with two or three units. All of the units designed for people with disabilities. 

We would then have a system for some of our home first support to be shared between all the residents in that property or that area. 

This would be a great way to provide support. around lunch time or late at night when there is a social event or a crisis.  From this project has come a real need for people wanting to be able to have more support. more often when they are living on their own. An example is, an idea for a night life support service provider would allow people the flexibility. to go out at night and come home at a time they want to come home. People would be able to go to bed. because they want to, not because they have to.

I have friends with disabilities living in East Ringwood, Bayswater, Ringwood and Croydon. Often I think it would be so nice to be able to go to their place at night. Chat, have a meal, watch a video. But while my hours have to be structured and managed carefully. Support workers also have a life and a family to care for too. It does become difficult.

Most of the support workers I have are very good. One of the successes is that most of them live within five or ten minutes of my house. This is the only way to have some flexibility and more reliability. 

In the past I have had problems with co ordinators not understanding how my system works. This can be very frustrating and exhausting when I have needed to find lost hours and be able to advocate for my rights. I have a calendar in my kitchen for support workers to write every shift time that they do. This calendar has been a very good means of self evidence.

One of the things that concern me about home first support. This is a general thought and not about my own service provider. Support Services need to be able to provide home first users quality care. I feel that there is a risk. for Support Services getting caught up in the running of the business. that the person’s support needs, the quality of care for that person may be taken less seriously. 

I see support workers leaving the job because the service provider has neglected their skills and abilities to pay them enough. I worry when I can not get weekend staff who are of my preference simply because there are no penalty rates. I 
have concerns about,  how will I manage on the same thirty four hours in a few years time, when my needs have changed. Hopefully the project susan and I are working on will eventuate into something successful.

More recently. I have had more input into my support plan with communications between the Homefirst, case managers . I really like this approach. It makes me feel more in control with the homefirst package. With this approach I have been able to use some of my funding to help purchase equipment for my disability needs, as well as to plan for holidays in advance. I like the approach of having someone separate from the agency, service provider to talk to.  It definitely allows for that individual approach and not just a business program. 

As much as I can say, that with the home first support I have a life and I can live independently on my own. None of it could have happened without the support people and the effort to bend and challenge the system to make it happen. home first is for real people who have individual needs. Let’s not forget that.

Thank you.