There are opportunities for practice nurses, with GP oversight, to assist in patient referrals for My Aged Care assessments. Patient medical record systems provide templates for health assessments and CMAs that can be performed by practice nurses and reviewed by GPs before sign off.
Referrals can be made via:
Patient consent
Prior to a referral being made, a person must have given consent for a health professional to provide information on their behalf. This information includes:
- Medicare or DVA details
- personal information, including date of birth and contact details.
Length of time to complete a referral
The Make a Referral form takes about 15–20 minutes to complete. However, access to the form is set for 60 minutes before it resets.
What happens after a referral?
Once a completed referral is received by My Aged Care, the information is sent directly to an ACAT assessor, who will call the patient to discuss and organise an assessment. This can take up to six weeks.
The ACAT assessment will determine whether a patient is eligible for government-funded services and which services they are eligible for.
Following up on referrals
General practices can follow up on GP referrals by calling the My Aged Care contact centre. The following information will be required:
- a confirmation number from the online referral
- GP details and the patient’s details.
The contact centre can provide information on:
- whether a referral has been made to an assessment organisation
- the type of assessment
- the name and contact details of the assessment organisation
- whether the patient has been referred for services, including the type of services, and whether they have been accepted by a provider
- whether the client has existing aged care approvals in place
- whether the referral you made has been closed, including the reason for closure.
Urgent referral
The preferred method for health professionals to access urgent services is by contacting the service provider directly. The service provider will, if able, provide urgent care for the patient and subsequently refer the patient to My Aged Care for an assessment of ongoing service needs.
Provider contact details can be accessed via telephone on 1800 200 422 or by using the Find a provider tool to search for a provider.