Te Hopai Home and Hospital

biggest challenges is that we initiate a care plan for a resident coming into the facility and then within sometimes days or weeks they’ve passed away. It’s an incredibly stressful environment for the staff, and another level of training we’ve had to provide.” Sari adds, “We also have younger residents. Last year we had three under the age of 50 in palliative care, they come and live with us and die within six to seven weeks. It was very disturbing for staff having young children crying in the room, quite a different scene than with older people. One of our funders has given very generously to individual and group counselling for our staff members, as needed. We are very fortunate to have three donors – Thomas George Macarthy Trust, Sutherland Self Help Trust and Public Trust NZ– that are invaluable to the ongoing success of the Te Hopai facility.” On the agenda for the future, Stewart stresses that dementia level care is “very close to our hearts. In Wellington, we don’t have enough dementia beds – here we have 16 and it’s our intention to build additional small dementia units on the greenfield here. With 5 to 6 beds in three units, so people with similar interests and cultural backgrounds can enjoy a conversation in a familiar environment. There are lots of good models of dementia-specific care in Australia and Europe, so we’re thinking around doing those type of much smaller units.” In essence, Te Hopai is succeeding well as an agile charitable trust competing against multinationals. Its tagline “Setting the standard for aged care” is not just an advertising slogan, it’s something the whole team passionately believes in. “It’s about the constant renewal and focus on what more we could be doing,” says Stewart. “Ultimately, we’re a medical facility but in a caring home environment; having a slightly higher ratio of staff so our carers can spend the time with each resident and care for them as part of the family. That’s what we’re most proud of.” TE HOPA I HOME AND HOSP I TAL PREFERRED VENDORS n Quantum Computers ltd www.qcomp.co.nz n MOA moabenchmarking.co.nz