“We are in dire straits,” says Alzheimers NZ Gisborne manager Tracy Robinson (right). She is pictured with Azure Hyde (Sherwood Club assistant/community support worker). Picture by Liam Clayton
Alzheimers NZ’s Gisborne services face permanent closure due to government funding restrictions, it was revealed yesterday.
“We’re clinging to the lifeboats,” Alzheimers Gisborne manager Tracy Robinson said.
“We may have to close down entirely by July. What happens then to all the families we support?”
About 100 people would be directly affected by a closure, not including family members.
“We’re in dire straits.”
However, just 40 percent of her annual operating costs are funded by government.
Last year Alzheimers Gisborne’s Sherwood Club celebrated its 30th anniversary.
It was one of the first Alzheimer’s organisations in New Zealand to have a day facility and rooms of its own for dementia patients.
Alzheimers NZ chief executive Catherine Hall said the system “is broken”.
“We’re not seeing any meaningful change.”
In 2022, Alzheimers NZ and Dementia NZ submitted a business case to the Government seeking an urgent cash injection into community support services of $9 million per year.
“At the time, government funding to these services contributed just $1.10 per person per year, and the estimate was that around 30,000 New Zealanders are missing out on support because they can’t get access to these services.
“The $9m is just to keep the lights on in the short term and start to expand services,” Ms Hall said.
“But government said ‘no’.”
Since then, the situation has only got worse, with Alzheimers organisations seeing demand for services up 165 percent in the first three months of 2023 compared to the same period last year.
“And the problem is exacerbated by our postcode health system which funds organisations differently in different regions.
“It’s far easier to access dementia support services in Tauranga, for example, where there’s more government money.
It was “very likely” community services in places like Gisborne would be further reduced, and even close on their watch, unless something changed soon, she said.
“As another Alzheimers organisation manager said to me recently: ‘We do vitally important work supporting really vulnerable people, yet we’re given scraps by government. Where’s their accountability?’.”
Ms Robinson said the Gisborne service already needed an increase in staff.
“We have just two staff. Ideally we need eight because of the escalating rate of referrals.
“The difficulty with finding the right people is that we are not able to pay the market rate for a health clinician as we do not receive any funding for the work we do in the community. Under the current scenario, we have to fundraise to pay for at least 2 staff to work in the community, one of whom is also the manager.
“While we receive funding from Te Whatu Ora Tairāwhiti to run the day facility, the Sherwood Club, it has to stretch so far that the staff wages are not much above the living wage. So, attracting new staff is a challenge.”
The day facility was down to two days a week from three, to allow staff to attend to the community clients as well as those in the Sherwood Club.
“We don’t want to let our clients down, or their families who need support when living with someone with a diagnosis of dementia.
“Ironically, the rate of dementia is growing so rapidly in Tairāwhiti that we could easily double our services to cater for that need.”
And that spike in demand was coming, Ms Hall said.
“It’s only to be expected because of Aotearoa New Zealand’s rapidly aging population.
“We are facing — and failing to respond to — the most significant demographic change in Aotearoa New Zealand’s history.
“Dementia prevalence is expected to more than double in coming years. It’s estimated that almost every New Zealand family will be affected by dementia at some point.”
That’s why Alzheimers NZ is now working with Dementia NZ to crunch the numbers to support a case for ‘future funding’ for these all-important community support services.
“Based on the current rate of referral increases, we’re going to need a lot more than just an extra $9 million a year to make sure people have access to the help they need, and that we can respond to the increasing numbers we know are coming with our ageing population.”
The gathering's organiser hopes a ceremony will be held annually until Jamie is found.