I heat my coffee milk to 60c with a steam want and the jug is uncomfortably hot past 50c. I don't understand how someone could test that with their bare hands and it be okay.
Absolutely. 60 is far too hot to put your hand in comfortably. In fact it’ll scald in seconds. I say this as a plastic surgeon who frequently deals with the aftermath of scalds and burns.
I was in a rental not far from where this story is based and had a plumber come around because our kitchen water was too hot. They were saying the max for kitchens and bathrooms is meant to be 50.
Ours was unusable just above 60 and we were just dipping our hands in it. I can’t imagine being fully bathed in water that hot.
True. Had a water heater installed about a decade ago and found out from the installer new regulations meant 50 had been the default for a while. He did show me how easy it is to change the temp though. I ended up manually maxing it out at 60 myself as it had to travel such a pipe distance it was only reaching 45 while on 50.
Since its been mandatory 50 for at least 15yrs now and most tanks die before 20yrs, there's a good chance someone manually changed the temperature setting.
That poor woman. Horribly neglectful and painful way to die.
I'll bet that the staff are too scared to report negligence and breaches of the guidelines. I even know why. In Canberra if you report WHS, Negligence and duty of care issues, for some reason, you don't have a job anymore. Canberra is an incestuous little town, and it isn't long before the whole sector knows about you and you're toast. You either go along with it, or try to stop it, and get cut out of the workplace so you can't help any more.
There is one company here that was regularly charging for 10 hours care and only delivering between 6 and 8 hours. Corruption is rife because for years there has been no governing body to report providers to.
The providers here need a broom going through them, nay a sandblaster. They've ripped off their clients and treated them like shit for long enough.
Why? Are you saying I'm a Karen because I give a tosser about our vulnerable people being ripped off by able bodied thieves? I don't understand your comment, other than it's reddit and most people are aholes.
I see. Thanks for the explanation. I did send this and all the information I had into the RC in aged care and the disability one. No idea what happened as I've been locked out of the industry.
The NCC requires that a tempering valve set at 50°C or lower be installed to areas where heated water is supplying basins, baths and showers. A wall panel that allows temperatures of 60°C to the bath would very much be illegal to install today. As other commenters have pointed out, it is possible that the hot water system here predates that particular code requirement.
I'm not sure of NSW standards but Victoria has a limit of 45°C at premises designed for children, elderly, and the disabled. The tempering standards have been around for 25 years so it's hard to believe a care facility was using a system older than that.
Yeah it varies by state, WA goes as low as 38° for some types of healthcare facilities. It sounds like this woman was in her home though receiving outpatient care so those requirements would not apply.
depending on manufacturer and age, they may be combined with the kitchen water heater as a single system, but the bathroom should have a lock function on the temp.
also sometimes for cleaning you may want very hot water.
Having done risk assessment for support in home, we aren't checking the temperature various taps are set to. In hindsight, this particular risk assessment should have included the temperature for her bathing, but it's not a standard thing.
It should be. Especially for older people with older homes there could be all kinds of death traps lurking about (note I know this was a young woman, but there should be a safety check across the board of gas/water/electrical, not just tripping hazards)
But it's the woman's home. A risk assessment is done for hazards to the worker, and for delivering service to the client, but not for the risk from the household hazards to the person living there.
Sometimes allied health will do these sorts of assessments, but interesting to note they aren't mentioned at all
When my grandmother started under MyAgedCare there was definitely a safety inspection of her home before anyone could come in and help. There was hand railing put in to help her specifically, so it's not just worker safety, rather for everyone's safety.
I don't recall, I wasn't part of the MyAgedCare planning, all I know is that someone came to inspect the house and work out what modifications it needed to accommodate her needs.
Absolutely. Obviously there has been negligence here by the carer, but that is why there are standards for things like water temperature in residential houses.
Idiotproofing is an extremely important safety feature.
> “Ms Lucas had multiple disabilities and health conditions, including Cornelia de Lange syndrome…These conditions included that the 28-year-old, who was non-verbal, had thin skin and was sensitive to temperature.”
> “The court was told the bath temperature in Ms Lucas's home was controlled by a wall panel that was usually set at 40 to 42 degrees Celsius… Live Better support workers checked the water temperature with her bare hand and "considered the water was fine”
> "Ms Lucas was seen moving and vocalising in a manner that was different to her usual behaviour," Ms Munro told the court… “She said when Ms Lucas was removed from the bath after one to two minutes, the staff noticed her skin was peeling and that the wall temperature panel was set at 60C”
This is not a “terrible accident”, this is murder, or at the very least, manslaughter.
I had a hot tub that got up to 46° celsius once.
It was as hot as I could possibly withstand. It was an absolute trial sitting in it for any length of time.
So awful for this poor woman, being literally cooked in scalding water.
Why the hell did the thermostat go up that high FFS!
Right? We had a temperature control thing on our shower when I was about 10 - so nearly 20 years ago - and I remember it went up to 54°. We weren't a disabled persons facility and that was just how it came. I don't know why any would go up to 60°C.
We set ours at 106F which is 41.1C and they had us sign a waiver when we bought it to change out the chip to allow it that hot. I think normally 103 (39.4C) is max normally
Idk if any normal person could put their hand in 60° water and consider that a normal temperature and its not unherd of for carers to deliberatly kill the person in their care. Its too early to tell
I think that using your hand alone is not good for checking water temp, as your hand is already wet and gets desensitised. I remember mum would use her elbow when preparing a bath.
But still, even with hands, 60 is way too hot (if the water was actually 60C).
Someone turned the thermostat up that high and then didn’t remove her when she cried out/“acted out of character”.
This would at the very least he manslaughter (intended to cause harm but not kill?) if not murder (depends whether it would be found that the average person knows 60 degree bath water would kill this woman, vs just injuring her).
Thermostats don’t magically get turned to 60 degrees, so if there’s no technical fault, someone turned the temperature up, perhaps once she was already in the tub.
I’m pretty sure negligence that leads to death is manslaughter
ETA: manslaughter via [criminal negligence](https://www.judcom.nsw.gov.au/publications/benchbks/criminal/manslaughter.html#:~:text=In%20order%20to%20establish%20manslaughter,a%20great%20falling%20short%20of)
> In order to establish manslaughter by criminal negligence, it is sufficient if the prosecution shows that the act which caused the death was done by the accused consciously and voluntarily, without any intention of causing death or grievous bodily harm but in circumstances which involved such a great falling short of the standard of care which a reasonable man would have exercised and which involved such a high risk that death or grievous bodily harm would follow that the doing of the act merited criminal punishment
Murder? Bullshit. Since 2013,a ll homes are supposed to have a tempering valve installed.
https://www.samedayhotwaterservice.com.au/plumbing-regulation-updates-tempering-valves/
The maximum under regular applications is supposed to be 50 degrees, For Hospitals/Aged Care applications, it is 45 degrees:
https://www.builtwatersolutions.com.au/single-post/2017/05/23/thermostatic-mixing-valves-tempering-valves
So it should not physically have been possible for the water to be this hot. 60 degrees is about the same temperature coming from the tank.
The Worker might not have been well versed in water temperature safety.
According to the same page I linked above, if a regular adult puts their finger in the water, it would take 5 seconds to get burned. Therefore it's possible the carer only dipped their finger in for only a fraction of a second, measuring to see if it actually is hot, as opposed to trying to determine if it is TOO hot, which shouldn't even be possible to be too hot.
So unless the Worker tampered with the tempering valve (I doubt it), to call this a MURDER is well off base.
The liability most likely lies in the building owner/plumber. If she is receiving in-home care from a government funded organisation (i.e. NDIS, Aged Care etc) then I would expect that they would cop some flak for not having it as part of their in-home assessments to check that the water temperatures are safe from the tap (and this should definitely be added to checklists if it is not)
I would also suggest other safety checks in older homes, like looking for one of these death heaters as well: https://www.servicetoday.com.au/blog/carbon-monoxide-and-gas-heater-safety-update-vulcan-heritage-or-pyrox-heritage/
There shouldn't be workers allowed who don't know about simple temperature safety. It's a total failing on the company's part for not keeping up to date with plumbing regulations and for hiring negligent workers. The worker should've been extra vigilant working with someone who had thin skin and sensitivity to temperatures.
Those temps would have done the same to anyone. Is it a standard nursing at home procedure to know about water temps as opposed to being a 'common sense' thing? Genuine question outside my sphere of knowledge. But the Worker is hardly the only one to blame for such a situation which should not even be possible. Even if the Worker should have known, were they actually taught? There are so many points of failure here, it doesn't stop at the person who actually did it.
People in care have a whole range of conditions, of different levels of attention, this is not logically proof of anything whatsoever - this does not mean that "Be extra careful not to cook this woman alive in hot water" was on her chart. And if it should have been, that is another potential failure point beyond the Worker where maybe something like this should have been charted but wasn't. Not to mention, this temperature would have killed anyone who couldn't escape the water in time, even without a temperature sensitivity. Your whole argument is flawed. NO EVIDENCE OF A MURDER.
I work with people with disabilities. There’s no way you wouldn’t notice the water was that hot. I’m skeptical worker tested it and isn’t just saying that now to try and dodge the negligence. There’s also no way worker didn’t know client was in pain. Never met a non verbal person who couldn’t communicate. Worker just didn’t give a shit.
Agreed. Either the client was being blatantly ignored, or she was left alone in the bathroom. I work with a lot of non-verbal clients, every single one of them can communicate discomfort if nothing else. This is fucked up.
Exactly! you know when they’re uncomfortable by their body language, facial expression, sometimes they have vocalisations you know mean unhappy, and you’d know the water is too hot you also be touching it while bathing them and standing right next to the tub, you’d feel the heat. Worker totally just left them in the tub I bet anything, which even in normal water we all know is not ok, people drown. It’s straight up criminal negligence.
There’s a chance that the non verbal client was also cognitively impaired and may have alway reacted badly to baths. This is not excusing not testing the water though.
Yeah maybe. But even then, I can’t see a scenario worker wouldn’t notice unless they left them unattended. It’s wild cause bathing is one of the riskiest activities, it’s where workers are supposed to be extra vigilant.
I have a non verbal daughter with cerebral palsy, pretty fucking easy to do 2 things, physically check the temperature of the water and don’t leave them unsupervised.
Prison time, large fines and revoking licences enabling this business to work in care should be what happens.
I work in disability services and this is fucking shocking to read. If your client has thin skin, you’re triple checking that water with a god damn thermometer before they go anywhere near it and you’re certainly checking that her temperature controlled bath is set to the correct temperature!
That worker deserves jail time. Fucking horrific.
Its terrible this shit keeps happening. But until the execs of care companies bother to train and PAY their staff properly. Then we will keep seeing these cases.
I say this having worked in care and seeing some of the eejits that pass the selection process who just don't care and don't think.
There would be a disturbingly high number of “carers” who are in it for the power it gives them over others. Just look at the Royal commission, some of the worst stories I’ve ever heard. Why do we leave our most vulnerable people to the mercy of companies whose main motivation is profit? Hopefully not for much longer but I’m just sorry for all the people who’ve suffered. Infuriating.
This is indicative of something way more sinister- not only how disabled people are treated, but how Aboriginal people are treated as well. Rest in peace. I’m so sorry
How terrible. Yet Bill Shorten seems committed to targeting allied health professionals like Occupational Therapists with the coming NDIS cuts when it’s unqualified unregulated support workers responsible for peoples deaths time after time.
The NDIS budget needs to be cut. It should not be a thing that half a million people on NDIS have an equivalent budget as 25 million people on Medicare. That does not account for the fact that the half a million NDIS participants will still utilise medicare funding either, and typically at a disproportionate rate.
You are a wildly insensitive human being. How on earth do you think permanently disabled people aren't going to require 'disproportionate' amounts of care. It is correctly proportionate.
The medicare budget needs to be increased, and that has nothing to do with the ndis.
Disabled people will always exist and you could become one at any time. Why shouldn't we look after them?
Health spending should always be on a needs basis.
So if you highlight disability funding, you should expect it to be significantly more per person than general public.
I also wouldn't use the word "disproportionate". That's.... Weird.
I don't see how it's relevant to the article.
The court heard that it was related to training.
So this
> unqualified unregulated support workers
Kinda makes little sense to me.
Ok, asshole, understood.
In my opinion there is a difference between training not being done correctly (what is alleged to be the case) and training not existing from a regulation and government standpoint, which is what Billy is saying.
If the allegation in the article regarding training is true, then there IS regulation AND the company intends to follow it, it just wasn't followed, without establishing why.
If the allegation is false, then it's not indicative of regulation at all, as it's simply a lie. And the issue is something else. Or at least it tells us nothing about the industry, until we find out what is the case.
In my opinion if you're worried about misinformation we shouldn't make shit up.
You and Billy would need to show how the coming NDIS cuts relate to this specific issue, I don't think you can do that based on information at hand.
It goes against the prevailing narrative the Govt is running and the media is often sucked into. Disabled people can be particularly vulnerable and the way you can just setup a private company and provide support work is just dodgey. At least with AHPs there is an external regulator already in AHPRA.
Report it to AHPRA. I’m sure it happens sometimes but they can lose their license. Despite Shorten’s focus on OT’s there are very few documented examples of malpractice, lots of speculation and misunderstanding of their role. Support workers however numerous documented examples including, this one resulting in someones death.
Dude reporting doesn’t do shit. If it’s an NDIS matter you report to the quality and safeguards commission, and they are extremely understaffed. They do nothing because they can’t.
My wife works in the psych ward. So government health department. The entire unit knew and reported an NDIS participants plan coordinator/support worker having a sexual relationship with the participant (a very mentally unwell man) and nothing happened. Besides half the time you can’t prove someone’s being exploited but it’s obvious. The NDIS is fucked, but yeah hard agree, it needs more regulating not funding cuts.
Theres some horrible stuff out there when very vulnerable people are involved. AHPRA still have scope in the NDIS. The NDIS Bureaucracy is pretty terrible. There needs to be independent review options but Govt bean counters never want to spend the money where it is needed.
I heat my coffee milk to 60c with a steam want and the jug is uncomfortably hot past 50c. I don't understand how someone could test that with their bare hands and it be okay.
Absolutely. 60 is far too hot to put your hand in comfortably. In fact it’ll scald in seconds. I say this as a plastic surgeon who frequently deals with the aftermath of scalds and burns.
I was in a rental not far from where this story is based and had a plumber come around because our kitchen water was too hot. They were saying the max for kitchens and bathrooms is meant to be 50. Ours was unusable just above 60 and we were just dipping our hands in it. I can’t imagine being fully bathed in water that hot.
It would’ve been absolutely torturous. Poor woman.
True. Had a water heater installed about a decade ago and found out from the installer new regulations meant 50 had been the default for a while. He did show me how easy it is to change the temp though. I ended up manually maxing it out at 60 myself as it had to travel such a pipe distance it was only reaching 45 while on 50. Since its been mandatory 50 for at least 15yrs now and most tanks die before 20yrs, there's a good chance someone manually changed the temperature setting. That poor woman. Horribly neglectful and painful way to die.
My guess is that no such test took place. What else are they going to say? "I was to lazy to even check"..
I've noticed that these providers put a lot of stock into simply offering an apology and nothing else. Wankers.
"No one meant her any harm" they said. Not really a defence for negligence is it
I'll bet that the staff are too scared to report negligence and breaches of the guidelines. I even know why. In Canberra if you report WHS, Negligence and duty of care issues, for some reason, you don't have a job anymore. Canberra is an incestuous little town, and it isn't long before the whole sector knows about you and you're toast. You either go along with it, or try to stop it, and get cut out of the workplace so you can't help any more. There is one company here that was regularly charging for 10 hours care and only delivering between 6 and 8 hours. Corruption is rife because for years there has been no governing body to report providers to. The providers here need a broom going through them, nay a sandblaster. They've ripped off their clients and treated them like shit for long enough.
Yo u need to write detailed letters to newspapers.
Why? Are you saying I'm a Karen because I give a tosser about our vulnerable people being ripped off by able bodied thieves? I don't understand your comment, other than it's reddit and most people are aholes.
Naw, i meant you need to do an anonymous expose and give it to credible news sources to build a case with. They can work with what you got
I see. Thanks for the explanation. I did send this and all the information I had into the RC in aged care and the disability one. No idea what happened as I've been locked out of the industry.
What would you have the do honestly? Old mates dead
I have such questions as "why does a bath wall panel go up to 60C?"
The NCC requires that a tempering valve set at 50°C or lower be installed to areas where heated water is supplying basins, baths and showers. A wall panel that allows temperatures of 60°C to the bath would very much be illegal to install today. As other commenters have pointed out, it is possible that the hot water system here predates that particular code requirement.
I'm not sure of NSW standards but Victoria has a limit of 45°C at premises designed for children, elderly, and the disabled. The tempering standards have been around for 25 years so it's hard to believe a care facility was using a system older than that.
Isn't it her own home, not a facility?
Yeah it varies by state, WA goes as low as 38° for some types of healthcare facilities. It sounds like this woman was in her home though receiving outpatient care so those requirements would not apply.
depending on manufacturer and age, they may be combined with the kitchen water heater as a single system, but the bathroom should have a lock function on the temp. also sometimes for cleaning you may want very hot water.
Where was the duty of care, risk assessment and ohs review of the house… wh&s legislation coves this
Having done risk assessment for support in home, we aren't checking the temperature various taps are set to. In hindsight, this particular risk assessment should have included the temperature for her bathing, but it's not a standard thing.
It should be. Especially for older people with older homes there could be all kinds of death traps lurking about (note I know this was a young woman, but there should be a safety check across the board of gas/water/electrical, not just tripping hazards)
But it's the woman's home. A risk assessment is done for hazards to the worker, and for delivering service to the client, but not for the risk from the household hazards to the person living there. Sometimes allied health will do these sorts of assessments, but interesting to note they aren't mentioned at all
When my grandmother started under MyAgedCare there was definitely a safety inspection of her home before anyone could come in and help. There was hand railing put in to help her specifically, so it's not just worker safety, rather for everyone's safety.
And who did that inspection?
I don't recall, I wasn't part of the MyAgedCare planning, all I know is that someone came to inspect the house and work out what modifications it needed to accommodate her needs.
In the ndis space, that would be an OT as funded in the plan. It's not within the scope of a core provider to do those sorts of assessments.
My laundry tap gets hotter than my bathroom or kitchen, I imagine for cleaning purposes and safety.
Absolutely. Obviously there has been negligence here by the carer, but that is why there are standards for things like water temperature in residential houses. Idiotproofing is an extremely important safety feature.
60C would be if you only turned on the hot water and not the cold at all
Hmmmm, I wonder what would happen if we privatised social care and provided no adult safeguarding oversight /s
> “Ms Lucas had multiple disabilities and health conditions, including Cornelia de Lange syndrome…These conditions included that the 28-year-old, who was non-verbal, had thin skin and was sensitive to temperature.” > “The court was told the bath temperature in Ms Lucas's home was controlled by a wall panel that was usually set at 40 to 42 degrees Celsius… Live Better support workers checked the water temperature with her bare hand and "considered the water was fine” > "Ms Lucas was seen moving and vocalising in a manner that was different to her usual behaviour," Ms Munro told the court… “She said when Ms Lucas was removed from the bath after one to two minutes, the staff noticed her skin was peeling and that the wall temperature panel was set at 60C” This is not a “terrible accident”, this is murder, or at the very least, manslaughter.
I had a hot tub that got up to 46° celsius once. It was as hot as I could possibly withstand. It was an absolute trial sitting in it for any length of time. So awful for this poor woman, being literally cooked in scalding water. Why the hell did the thermostat go up that high FFS!
Right? We had a temperature control thing on our shower when I was about 10 - so nearly 20 years ago - and I remember it went up to 54°. We weren't a disabled persons facility and that was just how it came. I don't know why any would go up to 60°C.
We set ours at 106F which is 41.1C and they had us sign a waiver when we bought it to change out the chip to allow it that hot. I think normally 103 (39.4C) is max normally
Tragic as that is, I’m confused as to how that meets the definition of murder?
People seem to forget there has to be intent for murder
Idk if any normal person could put their hand in 60° water and consider that a normal temperature and its not unherd of for carers to deliberatly kill the person in their care. Its too early to tell
It’s too early to tell yet ol mate up the top is very dramatically calling it murder
He also said “or manslaughter”
I think that using your hand alone is not good for checking water temp, as your hand is already wet and gets desensitised. I remember mum would use her elbow when preparing a bath. But still, even with hands, 60 is way too hot (if the water was actually 60C).
It is a tradgedy either way
Someone turned the thermostat up that high and then didn’t remove her when she cried out/“acted out of character”. This would at the very least he manslaughter (intended to cause harm but not kill?) if not murder (depends whether it would be found that the average person knows 60 degree bath water would kill this woman, vs just injuring her). Thermostats don’t magically get turned to 60 degrees, so if there’s no technical fault, someone turned the temperature up, perhaps once she was already in the tub.
I do think it’s quite a jump to murder based on the information we know. It sounds like a horrific accident/case of negligence.
I’m pretty sure negligence that leads to death is manslaughter ETA: manslaughter via [criminal negligence](https://www.judcom.nsw.gov.au/publications/benchbks/criminal/manslaughter.html#:~:text=In%20order%20to%20establish%20manslaughter,a%20great%20falling%20short%20of) > In order to establish manslaughter by criminal negligence, it is sufficient if the prosecution shows that the act which caused the death was done by the accused consciously and voluntarily, without any intention of causing death or grievous bodily harm but in circumstances which involved such a great falling short of the standard of care which a reasonable man would have exercised and which involved such a high risk that death or grievous bodily harm would follow that the doing of the act merited criminal punishment
I think cause the family suing wants more money?
The carer needs to be charged with murder
Should’nt parents or family be taking care too
Murder? Bullshit. Since 2013,a ll homes are supposed to have a tempering valve installed. https://www.samedayhotwaterservice.com.au/plumbing-regulation-updates-tempering-valves/ The maximum under regular applications is supposed to be 50 degrees, For Hospitals/Aged Care applications, it is 45 degrees: https://www.builtwatersolutions.com.au/single-post/2017/05/23/thermostatic-mixing-valves-tempering-valves So it should not physically have been possible for the water to be this hot. 60 degrees is about the same temperature coming from the tank. The Worker might not have been well versed in water temperature safety. According to the same page I linked above, if a regular adult puts their finger in the water, it would take 5 seconds to get burned. Therefore it's possible the carer only dipped their finger in for only a fraction of a second, measuring to see if it actually is hot, as opposed to trying to determine if it is TOO hot, which shouldn't even be possible to be too hot. So unless the Worker tampered with the tempering valve (I doubt it), to call this a MURDER is well off base. The liability most likely lies in the building owner/plumber. If she is receiving in-home care from a government funded organisation (i.e. NDIS, Aged Care etc) then I would expect that they would cop some flak for not having it as part of their in-home assessments to check that the water temperatures are safe from the tap (and this should definitely be added to checklists if it is not) I would also suggest other safety checks in older homes, like looking for one of these death heaters as well: https://www.servicetoday.com.au/blog/carbon-monoxide-and-gas-heater-safety-update-vulcan-heritage-or-pyrox-heritage/
There shouldn't be workers allowed who don't know about simple temperature safety. It's a total failing on the company's part for not keeping up to date with plumbing regulations and for hiring negligent workers. The worker should've been extra vigilant working with someone who had thin skin and sensitivity to temperatures.
Those temps would have done the same to anyone. Is it a standard nursing at home procedure to know about water temps as opposed to being a 'common sense' thing? Genuine question outside my sphere of knowledge. But the Worker is hardly the only one to blame for such a situation which should not even be possible. Even if the Worker should have known, were they actually taught? There are so many points of failure here, it doesn't stop at the person who actually did it.
She was temperature sensitive, so yes
People in care have a whole range of conditions, of different levels of attention, this is not logically proof of anything whatsoever - this does not mean that "Be extra careful not to cook this woman alive in hot water" was on her chart. And if it should have been, that is another potential failure point beyond the Worker where maybe something like this should have been charted but wasn't. Not to mention, this temperature would have killed anyone who couldn't escape the water in time, even without a temperature sensitivity. Your whole argument is flawed. NO EVIDENCE OF A MURDER.
Boiled a woman alive. Fucking hell.
How absolutely horrendous!
Omg. That poor woman 😭
That's actually horrific. > the staff noticed her skin was peeling Jesus fucking christ.
"Live Better"... what a name 😬
I work with people with disabilities. There’s no way you wouldn’t notice the water was that hot. I’m skeptical worker tested it and isn’t just saying that now to try and dodge the negligence. There’s also no way worker didn’t know client was in pain. Never met a non verbal person who couldn’t communicate. Worker just didn’t give a shit.
Agreed. Either the client was being blatantly ignored, or she was left alone in the bathroom. I work with a lot of non-verbal clients, every single one of them can communicate discomfort if nothing else. This is fucked up.
Exactly! you know when they’re uncomfortable by their body language, facial expression, sometimes they have vocalisations you know mean unhappy, and you’d know the water is too hot you also be touching it while bathing them and standing right next to the tub, you’d feel the heat. Worker totally just left them in the tub I bet anything, which even in normal water we all know is not ok, people drown. It’s straight up criminal negligence.
There’s a chance that the non verbal client was also cognitively impaired and may have alway reacted badly to baths. This is not excusing not testing the water though.
Yeah maybe. But even then, I can’t see a scenario worker wouldn’t notice unless they left them unattended. It’s wild cause bathing is one of the riskiest activities, it’s where workers are supposed to be extra vigilant.
I have a non verbal daughter with cerebral palsy, pretty fucking easy to do 2 things, physically check the temperature of the water and don’t leave them unsupervised. Prison time, large fines and revoking licences enabling this business to work in care should be what happens.
I work in disability services and this is fucking shocking to read. If your client has thin skin, you’re triple checking that water with a god damn thermometer before they go anywhere near it and you’re certainly checking that her temperature controlled bath is set to the correct temperature! That worker deserves jail time. Fucking horrific.
Its terrible this shit keeps happening. But until the execs of care companies bother to train and PAY their staff properly. Then we will keep seeing these cases. I say this having worked in care and seeing some of the eejits that pass the selection process who just don't care and don't think.
"Woman's family sues because her bath was too hot." - LiveBetter probably.
There would be a disturbingly high number of “carers” who are in it for the power it gives them over others. Just look at the Royal commission, some of the worst stories I’ve ever heard. Why do we leave our most vulnerable people to the mercy of companies whose main motivation is profit? Hopefully not for much longer but I’m just sorry for all the people who’ve suffered. Infuriating.
That sounds like a horror movie, I hope the responsible people get sued.
This is indicative of something way more sinister- not only how disabled people are treated, but how Aboriginal people are treated as well. Rest in peace. I’m so sorry
Nailed it. Unfortunately :(
This poor woman... I cannot imagine.
Oops actually murder
From my interactions with some NDIS providers, they treat their clients like cash cows and have very little care for the person.
How terrible. Yet Bill Shorten seems committed to targeting allied health professionals like Occupational Therapists with the coming NDIS cuts when it’s unqualified unregulated support workers responsible for peoples deaths time after time.
The NDIS budget needs to be cut. It should not be a thing that half a million people on NDIS have an equivalent budget as 25 million people on Medicare. That does not account for the fact that the half a million NDIS participants will still utilise medicare funding either, and typically at a disproportionate rate.
You are a wildly insensitive human being. How on earth do you think permanently disabled people aren't going to require 'disproportionate' amounts of care. It is correctly proportionate.
The medicare budget needs to be increased, and that has nothing to do with the ndis. Disabled people will always exist and you could become one at any time. Why shouldn't we look after them?
Health spending should always be on a needs basis. So if you highlight disability funding, you should expect it to be significantly more per person than general public. I also wouldn't use the word "disproportionate". That's.... Weird.
Don’t know why you’re downvoted .. you’re correct
I don't see how it's relevant to the article. The court heard that it was related to training. So this > unqualified unregulated support workers Kinda makes little sense to me.
Like, the word unqualified and training don't ring in your ears are being related at all? Is there paid disinformation going on in this thread?
Ok, asshole, understood. In my opinion there is a difference between training not being done correctly (what is alleged to be the case) and training not existing from a regulation and government standpoint, which is what Billy is saying. If the allegation in the article regarding training is true, then there IS regulation AND the company intends to follow it, it just wasn't followed, without establishing why. If the allegation is false, then it's not indicative of regulation at all, as it's simply a lie. And the issue is something else. Or at least it tells us nothing about the industry, until we find out what is the case. In my opinion if you're worried about misinformation we shouldn't make shit up. You and Billy would need to show how the coming NDIS cuts relate to this specific issue, I don't think you can do that based on information at hand.
It goes against the prevailing narrative the Govt is running and the media is often sucked into. Disabled people can be particularly vulnerable and the way you can just setup a private company and provide support work is just dodgey. At least with AHPs there is an external regulator already in AHPRA.
Agree. But hey, I’ve seen plenty OTs n “clinical” service providers exploit the hell out of participants.
Report it to AHPRA. I’m sure it happens sometimes but they can lose their license. Despite Shorten’s focus on OT’s there are very few documented examples of malpractice, lots of speculation and misunderstanding of their role. Support workers however numerous documented examples including, this one resulting in someones death.
Dude reporting doesn’t do shit. If it’s an NDIS matter you report to the quality and safeguards commission, and they are extremely understaffed. They do nothing because they can’t. My wife works in the psych ward. So government health department. The entire unit knew and reported an NDIS participants plan coordinator/support worker having a sexual relationship with the participant (a very mentally unwell man) and nothing happened. Besides half the time you can’t prove someone’s being exploited but it’s obvious. The NDIS is fucked, but yeah hard agree, it needs more regulating not funding cuts.
Theres some horrible stuff out there when very vulnerable people are involved. AHPRA still have scope in the NDIS. The NDIS Bureaucracy is pretty terrible. There needs to be independent review options but Govt bean counters never want to spend the money where it is needed.