A state-of-the-art, $18 million expansion to Southern Cross Care aged care service in Darwin has opened. Source: NT News.
Southern Cross Care hosted an official opening on Wednesday for 26 additional residential aged care rooms at its Pearl Supported Care facility in Fannie Bay, which form a new memory support unit.
It also established an age-friendly health and fitness centre to help slow down the onset of frailty and delay hospitalisations.
Southern Cross Care chief executive David Moran said the project would transform the delivery of aged care and healthy ageing services in Greater Darwin.
“The new memory support unit at Pearl Supported Care is so important,” he said.
“It increases our capacity to care for older Territorians by 30 per cent, incorporating a dementia-friendly design that will help residents to feel at home and enjoy a good quality of life.”
Mr Moran said the health centre also had the potential to double the number of clients who could access its services.
“Our health and fitness team has … is already running services from the new centre, including four group sessions a day that support older Territorians to build strength, improve balance and improve their health,” he said.
“This will keep more people out of the hospital system and in residential aged care for longer.”
Design features aimed to help with memory and confusion include different coloured doors for each bedroom, memory box displays by each door, and circuit corridors and paths.
Staff entries are also concealed to help residents feel they are at home and not a workplace.
The project was constructed with significant financial assistance from the federal Government, on free land provided by the NT government.
FULL STORY
Southern Cross Care unveils state-of-the-art memory unit in Fannie Bay (By Fia Walsh, NT News)
