The use of elder care and the importance of cultural factors

Australia's population is more diverse today than in the past and is ageing at a faster pace compared with other developed countries. The government's decision to age in place has placed increasing pressure on families to undertake informal care of their aged family members. This is a process of risk assignment of care away from the government in terms of formal care to those in the community. The government has supported this in providing a range of formal care services such as homecare and community aged care packages. However, in the design of the support network they have made important assumptions that is everyone has equal access and opportunity cost to this information and services. For a large group of elderly and their carers the opportunity cost is high in accessing these information and services and culture is an explanatory factor for this. This research explores the level of knowledge and access by providers and recipients of aged care. This is particularly salient in many ethnic cultures where the process of putting a family member in residential aged care is looked down upon. The expectation is for families to care for their aged parent and/or relatives and if use is made of formal care services, the family members would feel ostracised by their ethnic community for their actions. This paper begins by discussing the changing cultural makeup of Australians today and the value placed on the aged in this society. This is followed by a description of the method used in this study of collecting primary data using two forms: distribution of survey instruments and in- depth interviews with providers of care and other stakeholders. The paper concludes by providing analysis of both the quantitative and qualitative data that demonstrate that cultural factors are highly important in access to community and residential aged services by both the care recipient and their family. Field of Research: Government Policy; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs, Economics of the Elderly; Social Norms and Social Capital;