$12m for care of elderly outside board's area

The Auckland District Health Board is spending $12 million on rest-home beds for elderly people who live outside its area, and it wants changes to the funding system to compensate.

Board chairman Wayne Brown said the board was trying to get the Government to move to regional funding of elderly health care. Funding across Greater Auckland would be a lot easier to manage.

"If your sick aunt from Manurewa needs to go into an elderly care bed, the chances are she will probably end up in Auckland central for a couple of reasons. One, there's more beds there and two, it's central for all her grandchildren and everything.

"Counties Manukau get the funding but we get the cost because she chooses to cross the border."

Services for the elderly were devolved to district health boards in October.

They were previously handled centrally by the Ministry of Health, which worked directly with rest homes.

The Auckland District Health Board's chief planning and funding officer, Denis Jury, said Auckland had about twice as many rest-home beds per head of population as the rest of the country.

It was effectively financed on an average basis, but its service provision was not average. As a result it ended up with a funding gap.

The board spent about $12 million - "a significant piece of the ADHB deficit" - providing care for people outside its area, he said.

It spent about $70 million on residential care.

The board was working with the Ministry of Health on a short-term solution to bridge the funding gap.