Home Care Quality Indicators: Key Points

  • Quality indicators give families an objective basis for comparing providers, beyond glossy brochures and sales conversations.
  • Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards took effect on 1 November 2025 and now apply to all home care providers under the new Aged Care Act.
  • The Registry of Senior Australians (ROSA) tracks 15 quality and safety indicators for home care, including medication safety, hospitalisations, and wait times to care commencement.
  • My Aged Care Star Ratings currently apply to residential aged care homes. For home care, use the My Aged Care provider profiles, Commission compliance records, and direct questions during provider assessments.
  • No quality data tool replaces a site visit or a direct conversation with a provider’s current clients. Use data to shortlist, then ask the right questions to decide.

Why Quality Indicators Matter for Home Care

Choosing a home care provider for a family member is one of the most important decisions a family makes. The stakes are high: the right provider supports independence, dignity, and wellbeing. The wrong one can lead to poor care outcomes, safety risks, or, at minimum, wasted funding and avoidable stress.

The challenge is that providers often look similar on the surface. Most have professional websites, polished brochures, and trained sales staff. Quality indicators give families a way to look past the marketing and compare providers on objective, outcome-based measures.

In Australia, several systems now exist to help families do this. Understanding how each works, and what it does and does not tell you, is the starting point for a well-informed comparison.

The Regulatory Framework: What Quality Standards Apply

The Aged Care Act 2024 and Strengthened Standards

Australia’s new Aged Care Act came into force in November 2024, with strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards applying from 1 November 2025. These updated standards apply to all aged care providers, including home care providers delivering services under the Support at Home program that launched in November 2025.

The strengthened standards are built around seven pillars:

  1. The person
  2. The organisation
  3. The care and services
  4. The environment
  5. Clinical care
  6. Food and nutrition
  7. Community connection and inclusion

For home care, the most relevant pillars are 1 (respecting the person’s rights, goals, and preferences), 2 (governance, workforce quality, and complaints management), and 3 (safe, effective, and person-centred delivery of supports).

These standards are not just a compliance document. They are a practical framework families can use to ask better questions when comparing providers. A provider should be able to describe, in plain language, how they meet each standard in practice.

The Support at Home Program

The Support at Home program replaced Home Care Packages from November 2025. Under this program, eligible older Australians receive a budget allocated to one of eight classification levels, with more flexibility to direct funding to specific support needs. All providers delivering Support at Home services must be approved and are subject to the strengthened Quality Standards.

One change relevant to quality comparison: the Support at Home program introduced clearer pricing transparency requirements, with providers required to publish their prices and services. This makes direct cost and service comparisons between providers more straightforward than under the previous Home Care Package model.

Quality Indicator Tool 1: My Aged Care Provider Profiles

The My Aged Care Find a Provider tool is the starting point for any provider comparison. Each approved provider has a profile that includes:

  • Services offered and geographic areas covered.
  • Whether the provider is government-funded (approved provider) or private.
  • Published prices for common services (required under the Support at Home program).
  • Consumer experience information where available.
  • Contact details.

How to use it: Search by location and support type. Compare the services listed against your family member’s specific needs. Check whether published prices are transparent and itemised, or whether the profile defers to “contact us for pricing.” Providers who display clear, itemised pricing are generally more transparent in their broader operations.

Limitation: Profile information is self-reported and not independently verified at the profile level. Use it as a starting filter, not a final assessment.

Quality Indicator Tool 2: My Aged Care Star Ratings

The My Aged Care Star Rating system assigns residential aged care homes a rating from 1 to 5 stars based on four performance areas:

  • Compliance: audit outcomes and compliance history with the Quality Standards.
  • Staffing: care minutes delivered per resident and the proportion delivered by registered nurses.
  • Quality Measures: clinical outcomes such as pressure injuries, unplanned weight loss, falls and fractures, medication incidents, and physical restraint use.
  • Residents’ Experience: survey results from independent interviews with residents.

Important limitation for home care families: Star Ratings currently apply only to residential aged care homes, not to home care providers. If you are choosing a provider that operates both residential and home care services, the residential Star Rating gives some indication of the organisation’s overall quality culture, but it does not directly reflect the quality of their home care delivery.

For home care, the equivalent quality comparison tools are ROSA outcome data and Commission compliance records, described below.

Quality Indicator Tool 3: ROSA Outcome Data

The Registry of Senior Australians (ROSA), run through the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI), tracks 15 quality and safety indicators for home care package recipients. These indicators are drawn from linked health data and represent objective, clinician-relevant measures of care outcomes.

The 15 home care quality indicators tracked by ROSA are:

IndicatorWhat It Measures
Antipsychotic useProportion of clients prescribed antipsychotics
Chronic opioid useProportion on long-term opioid medications
Sedative loadExposure to combinations of sedating medications
Antibiotic useFrequency and appropriateness of antibiotic prescribing
Fall-related hospitalisationsHospital admissions with a fall-related diagnosis
FracturesHospital admissions with a fracture diagnosis
Premature mortalityDeaths in the cohort, risk-adjusted
Medication-related hospitalisationsAdmissions attributable to medication problems
Weight loss or malnutrition hospitalisationsAdmissions related to nutrition concerns
Delirium or dementia hospitalisationsAdmissions linked to cognitive health crises
Emergency department presentationsRate of ED visits (not all admissions)
Pressure injury hospitalisationsAdmissions with a pressure wound diagnosis
Chronic disease management plansProportion with an active GP management plan
Home medicines reviewsProportion who have had a pharmacist review
Wait time to care commencementDays from eligibility approval to first service

How to use ROSA data: ROSA produces provider-level reports and publishes aggregate data. As of December 2025, individual provider reports became available for providers to request. Families can ask a prospective provider whether they have a ROSA report and to share their results, particularly for indicators such as fall-related hospitalisations, ED presentations, and wait times.

A 2025 ROSA analysis found that 51.3% of home care recipients waited more than six months from their eligibility assessment approval to care commencement. This wait time indicator, while partly a systemic issue, also reflects how proactively individual providers manage intake and onboarding.

Limitation: ROSA data is based on linked health records, which means it reflects outcomes for clients who have used Medicare and hospital services. It is most useful as a population-level quality benchmark and for comparing providers at an organisational level, rather than predicting an individual’s experience.

Quality Indicator Tool 4: Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission Records

The Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission is the independent regulator that audits providers, investigates complaints, and issues compliance notices.

Families can use the Commission’s website to:

  • Check whether a provider has any current compliance notices, sanctions, or banning orders.
  • Review published audit outcomes for providers.
  • Access the Aged Care Quality Bulletin, which publishes sector-wide quality findings.

How to use it: Search the Commission’s provider register for the specific providers you are considering. Any sanctions or compliance notices are a serious red flag. The absence of notices does not mean a provider has no quality issues, but its presence signals that the regulator has identified a problem serious enough to warrant action.

You can also make a complaint to the Commission about any approved aged care provider. The Commission investigates complaints and can require providers to take corrective action.

Questions to Ask Providers Directly

No online tool captures the full picture of what it is like to receive care from a specific provider. After using quality indicator tools to shortlist providers, ask each shortlisted provider the following during your assessment or introductory meeting:

Staffing and workforce:

  • What is the average tenure of your support workers? High turnover is associated with inconsistent care.
  • Do all workers have current police checks, and do those delivering clinical supports have the required qualifications?
  • How do you match workers to clients, and what happens if a regular worker is unavailable?

Quality and safety:

  • When was your last audit, and what was the outcome? Can you share a summary?
  • What are your most common complaints, and how do you address them?
  • How do you track whether care is achieving my family member’s stated goals?

Responsiveness and communication:

  • How quickly do you respond to concerns raised by families?
  • Who is my primary contact, and what happens when that person is unavailable?
  • How do you communicate changes to care schedules, workers, or service plans?

Pricing and administration:

  • Are your prices published and itemised? Can I see a sample invoice?
  • What is your process if I want to redirect funding to a different type of support?
  • How do you handle requests to change, increase, or reduce services?

Warning Signs to Watch For

When comparing providers, the following patterns are worth taking seriously:

On quality records:

  • Any current compliance notices or sanctions from the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission.
  • Multiple unresolved complaints visible through the Commission.
  • Reluctance to share audit outcomes or quality reports when asked.

During the assessment or sales conversation:

  • Staff cannot explain how the provider measures care outcomes, only how many services they deliver.
  • Pricing is vague, bundled, or deferred to a follow-up conversation.
  • The provider cannot name the specific worker(s) who would be assigned.
  • Pressure to sign a service agreement on the spot without time to review.

After care commences:

  • Frequent worker changes without explanation or notice.
  • Care plan reviews that are delayed or skipped entirely.
  • Invoices that do not match the agreed services or rates.
  • Complaints that are acknowledged but not resolved within a reasonable timeframe.

Comparing Providers: A Practical Framework

Use this framework to structure your comparison of up to three home care providers:

CriteriaProvider AProvider BProvider C
My Aged Care profile complete and transparent
Published, itemised pricing available
No current Commission compliance notices
Willing to share recent audit outcome
ROSA report available on request
Worker screening and qualifications confirmed
Clear complaints process with contact details
Named case manager or primary contact
Worker stability (low turnover indicated)
Response time to family enquiries

Score each provider on criteria that matter most to your family member’s situation. The provider with the strongest overall profile across your priorities is a more informed choice than one selected on price or proximity alone.

Key External Resources

Carevo connects families with vetted aged care providers across Australia. Search our provider directory to compare home care providers in your area and find the right match for your family member’s needs.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are aged care quality indicators? Quality indicators are measurable outcomes used to assess the safety and quality of care. For home care, ROSA tracks 15 indicators including medication safety, fall-related hospitalisations, and ED presentations. Residential homes also have My Aged Care Star Ratings across four performance areas.

Do home care providers have Star Ratings? The formal Star Rating system currently applies to residential aged care homes. For home care providers, use the My Aged Care provider profiles, Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission compliance records, and ROSA outcome data where available.

Where can I check a provider’s quality record? Start with the My Aged Care Find a Provider tool and the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission website, which publishes compliance notices and sanctions. Ask the provider directly for their most recent audit outcome.

What changed for home care quality in November 2025? Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards took effect on 1 November 2025 under Australia’s new Aged Care Act. These updated standards apply to all home care providers and place greater emphasis on individual rights, dignity, and person-centred outcomes.

How do I compare providers on price? Under the Support at Home program that launched in November 2025, providers are required to publish their service prices and service descriptions. Use the My Aged Care Find a Provider tool to compare published prices across providers in your area, and ask each provider for a sample itemised schedule of fees.

What if I am unhappy with my current provider’s quality? Raise concerns in writing with the provider first and request a formal response. If the issue is not resolved, you can make a complaint to the Aged Care Quality and Safety Commission. You also have the right to change providers at any time with appropriate notice under your service agreement.