A revolutionary aged care ‘home model’ in Canberra is radically transforming the sector – no uniforms, staff can bring their kids or pets, and the ratio of carers to residents with early onset dementia is 1:3.

The Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety demanded “fundamental and systematic aged care reform”; well, Community Home Australia is fundamentally different. It is the only one of its kind in Australia.

So confident is the co-founder, Dr Rodney Jilek, that he gave $100,000 to the University of Canberra to fund a PhD student to study his model. He also spent $1.5 million of his own money on a house in Gordon to kickstart the not-for-profit venture. He leases two other houses in Monash and Nelligen, NSW.

Dr Jilek and co-founder Nicole Smith, both registered nurses, are starting a new “it takes a village” movement.

“The old aged care sector is broken but it’s still making money and people are hesitant to give up their old ways,” Ms Smith says.

“We create a supportive village around people’s dementia and we hold them close all the way to the end, all the way to palliative care. So, once you’re in our fold, we don’t let you go. We nurture you through that whole time.”

This is no reinvention of the wheel, it is simply giving those with dementia a life – going to the barbers for a haircut, even going to get a tattoo. The first house was full within five days, and two years on, all of our houses in the ACT are full.

“We want to change the way we think about caring for our elders,” Ms Smith says. “The word ‘staff’ doesn’t exist, we all eat together. We break down that culture that’s been holding us back. We wrote this model as a rebellion to the aged care sector and as an alternative.”

For 65-year-old Canberran Hector Steele, who used to be a strapper for the Canberra Raiders and head mechanic for Transport Canberra, living with dementia made him realise “I’m not what I think I am”.

“That sort of became like a big fall-out in your life to be honest,” he says. “I had it in my head that ‘no, I’m fine, there’s nothing wrong with me’.  Then a little bit down the track things were …. things just are not there, things that you’ve done all your life, it doesn’t work.”

Mr Steele loves the intergenerational programs run by Community Home Canberra and adores his “adopted” grandkids. Dr Jilek is modest about his philanthropy, saying he’s “just the enabler”.

“It’s not a welcome change to institutional aged care,” he says.

“We offer something that they choose not to. We are not for profit. We have 28 staff and there’s one person in this organisation that doesn’t get paid – that’s me.”

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