A Support Coordinator can help you maximise your NDIS funding and make sure you get the most value out of your plan. They can also help you make decisions over the services you receive, so you get the support you want. They can advise you on other mainstream services that may also help you fulfill your goals and take off the administrative obligations of managing receipts and invoices and budgeting your funding so it lasts the full 12 month period.

NDIS plan management is the way the funding in your National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) plan is managed. There are several kinds of plan management so making the right choice is important. Whenever you access a service or a piece of equipment using your NDIS plan, a financial transaction is made. Every transaction made using the funds in your plan has to follow the rules of the NDIS and be tracked and accounted for. Plan management is the choice you make about who is responsible for tracking your budgets and paying your service providers.

Agency-managed plans are managed directly by the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA). The majority of NDIS plans are managed this way.

If your plan is agency managed, the NDIA is responsible for paying providers for any equipment or services you book with them. Service providers can invoice the NDIS directly or, if you have support coordination funding in your plan, you can receive help from a support coordinator employed by the NDIA or a local area coordinator employed by a third party.

The main benefit of this is you do not have to track spending and manage the finances of your plan and can instead focus on organising and receiving services.

The main downside of this option is it is less flexible. You are limited to booking services from NDIS registered providers, and you will have to seek approval from the NDIA for all purchases, including small purchases made under your consumables budget.

If you want to take complete control of your plan you might want to self-manage. This may be the route to take if you feel confident in organising your own services, managing money, and completing complex paperwork.

When you self-manage you are directly responsible for the funding in your plan and will need to manage receipts, invoices, and service bookings yourself.

Some advantages of this approach are:

1. You can directly access certain parts of your plan.
For example, you can purchase items which fall under your consumables budget, and then claim payment from the NDIA for them.

2. You can book services with providers who are not registered with the NDIS.

Some advantages of this approach are:

1. You are responsible for managing costs, keeping records, and ensuring that you use the funding in your plan correctly.

2. You may need to organise service agreements with your providers.

The third option is to have a third party manage your plan on your behalf as a “plan manager”. This could be an accountant or one of the many plan management organisations that have started up since the NDIS began.

As opposed to an agency-managed plan, where you meet with your support coordinator or local area coordinator to discuss services, you instead meet with a plan manager.

The plan managed option provides many advantages of the self-managed option, while reducing the administrative burden on you. However, you are still partially responsible for ensuring funding is spent correctly.

You will have to pay a fee to your plan manager for their services, however it is possible to receive funding in your plan for plan management.

Maybe you want to be able to self-manage your consumables budget but leave service booking and payment to someone else? In that case you can elect to have different parts of your plan managed in different ways. You can always change your mind. No matter which option you start off with, you can always change the way your plan is managed.

Case management is a collaborative process where an individual’s needs are assessed, a plan is developed and services that a client requires are agreed upon which are tailored to meet the client’s individual needs. The client’s progress is then monitored along the way and reviewed regularly to assess whether the plan is working for the client or needs modifications.

There a many reason, why case management is important for clients. Below are just a few of the reasons:

1. It outlines a client current care needs. This enables any new carers to get familiar with the client’s care requirements quickly and if a client is ever hospitalised it also informs medical staff of the current care plans, and the client’s level of supports they require.

2. It assists medical professionals in devising care plans as previous plans can be referenced and will inform the specialist on what was working and what didn’t work. It also can help specialists identify any patterns that may affect a client’s care. For example: a client with epilepsy may have their seizures predominantly when they are asleep or around the same time every month. This could help determine triggers for the seizures such as hormonal changes around menstrual cycle for women.

3. As parents we will not be around forever and although we know the care requirements of our family member others may not. Having the care plans, medical history, procedures, schedules etc. documented, ensures that when you are no longer able to provide this care that wherever the client may go from there, the level of care is maintained as it is clearly documented for others to follow.

4. It assists families and clients to identify, goals for a client’s NDIS plan. Under NDIS a client may have goals in multiple facets of their lives and like with case management these goals require assessment, monitoring and reviewing.

Therefore, when assessing the suitability of a goal, it will be assessed on why the goal is important, how does the goal helps the client, how can it be measured to assess if the goal is working or not working for the client. The goal must be monitored and reviewed along the process to assess if it is working for the client and if it isn’t to reassess if it can be modified in some way to help the goal work better for the client. This is where the case management and data collection process is important to document these processes.

It also provides supporting evidence that will be required to support the client’s claim for NDIS funding. By having detailed information on the client’s care requirements, it helps maximise the funding by demonstrating a need.

A care plan outlines the care a client requires for a particular condition. It outlines a treatment plan. A care plan can include exercises a client is required to do, if will outline the number of repetitions and how often the client is expected to complete the exercises, any medications a client is expected to take and the frequency, it will outline any dos and don’ts, as well as some information about the condition the client has.

By having a written care plan everybody who provides care to the client knows what to do to manage that particular condition. It also ensures that the client’s care is consistent.

The care plan is used as well by medical professionals to monitor a client’s condition. It helps the medical practitioner to identify any patterns and any possible triggers. Therefore a client’s medications may be adjusted to work better for the client.

For example, a epilepsy management plan will outline the type of seizures a client has, what they look like, any known triggers for them, what medications the client is on to manage their epilepsy including the name of the medication, the dosage, the frequency, if they have any prn medications for epilepsy and under what circumstances that medication can be used. The plan will ask you to document the seizure, what time it occurred, the length of the seizure, what it looked like, how long it took for the client to recover and even what the client was doing just before the seizure. This information is used by medical practitioners to review the client’s medications and management of their epilepsy and this information can be used as evidence for supports under NDIS for claims under their plan.

A care plan can also outline strict guidelines on what not to do. For example, after a seizure the client may be disorientated and can be weak. The plan may state that as long as the client is in a position free of danger and comfortable not to move them for a given period of time. Or you may need to do an assessment of the client to check they have not received any other obvious injuries if they fell or hit something whilst having a seizure. They may require first aid. If a client has hit their head a doctor’s check-up could be ordered.

Under NDIS a client can get funding to help them with their goals and to manage their disability care requirements. Vicki Mills at Get Organised Client Services has had over 10 years working in the community sector with clients with a variety of conditions in both high needs and drop-in support. Vicki is proficient in case management and disability care. Vicki takes a person-centred approach to her work.

Having all those years of experience enables Vicki to provide sound advice to her clients and helps clients understand the requirements of the NDIS for gaining funding for particular goals.

For example, a client who is in a wheelchair can get funding to help towards the maintenance of their chair or for occupational therapy for development of a new mould for their wheelchair as their condition has changed.

When identifying goals for NDIS a client needs to take a wholistic approach. The client may have several goals in many parts of their life that they would like to achieve. These may be around life skills, learning to cook for themselves, travel on public transport independently, learn to budget their money, to gain a job, to undertake some kind of study, to form some new friendships with others their own age, the obtain aids to assist them in their daily lives, such as a wheelchair or walker, incontinence aids, communication aids such as a communication board, assistance with cleaning their home if they are physically unable etc.

The process to obtain the funding is not just identifying goals. You must also provide supporting evidence to support you claim. This may come in the form of reports from medical practitioners, data collection, care plans and by explaining the impact of not having the item or funding is having on the client and others.

For example: a client who is a small child may be able to be lifted by hand in and out of a wheelchair to lounge, bed etc but as they getting bigger a need for a hoist may be required. This is to enable the client to still do the things they have been but without the risk of injury to the carer moving the client from place to place.

Get Organised Client Services can help clients with identifying goals for their NDIS Plans, create the data collection sheets to collect the data to support the goals, help client’s in documenting the impact of not having the funding for that goal is having on the client and others who provide care to the client, as well as providing advice on how a client may obtain supporting evidence to support a particular goal. Vicki can also explain about how the funding works in a NDIS plan and what is support coordination and how that process works.

Although as the primary carer you know exactly what care your family member may require a carer that comes in to help support the client and the family may not know the care requirements.

Most clients like to follow a set routine as it reduces anxiety and when everyone follows the same routine and care plans then the client knows exactly what is happening, when and why.

Every client and their needs are different and therefore the care requirements will be too. The right carer for a client will not only be qualified to complete all the care requirements but may also need to have other characteristics that would make them a more suitable carer for the client. Some examples of this could be:

• Being fluent in another language- foreign language, Auslan, Key Word Sign etc.

• Speak English clearly for some clients having an accent can make it difficult for them to understand.

• The client may have a therapy dog and would require a carer to be happy to work with the dog around.

• If you are transporting a client, you may need to have a car that will accommodate a foldable wheelchair or a walker.

• The type of car may also be an issue if you have a client with mobility issues. Getting in and out of a car where the seat is to high or low.

You may also prefer a carer of a particular age range or gender, so the client can relate to them better and feels more comfortable with if they are performing personal care tasks.

A carer profile is like a job description but also provides a few details about the client’s care needs. It outlines the client’s and families expectations as well as the hours required etc.

Vicki at Get Organised Client Services has over 10 years’ experience, working in the community sector. Having worked herself in many roles from group homes, respites, youth work, mental health, agency work, and drop-in support Vicki has seen the challenges carers face coming to a shift when they have been provided limited information. She has also seen the benefits of when staff are given a detailed care plan and understand the client’s care needs.

When the carer knows the client’s needs and the client’s and family’s expectations of the role including the tasks required then everybody is on the same page, so it becomes a win-win situation for everyone. The carer is happy as they know what is expected and how to care for the client and the client is less anxious as they know who is coming, they know their routine and care requirements will be consistent with their current care they are receiving. The families have peace of mind that the care requirements are not only being met but are consistent with how they like it done.

By having Vicki write the advertisement she is going to write it in such a way that it gives a detailed job description of the role. She can also write a carer profile that can be sent to interested carers giving them a more detailed description of the role. This means you don’t get all these carers applying that would not suit the role.

Many agency staff are given limited to no information about a client that they are expected to care for. When they arrive on shift they are often faced with a limited handover, and if it’s a supported accommodation service, agency staff are called when they cannot fill it with any familiar staff. Supported accommodation services do however have extensive case management and care plans documented in the client’s folders. Although this is a great reference point, when agency staff are called in they don’t often have the opportunity to read the client files before they have to assist with supporting the client.

For community-based clients there is often even less information a carer can access to get information about a client. Not only does this pose a challenge for the carer to know exactly what the care requirements are for that client but it’s also quite dangerous.

If a carer does not know a client is an absconder, is allergic to a medication or food, afraid of dogs, follows a particular diet such as a celiac or diabetic, has a PRN medication for epilepsy etc it could potentially lead to a life threatening situation. Saying this, it is also very important a carer profile includes this as a carer needs to be trained in managing these situations.

You would not want to have a carer who is not trained to handle a care requirement of a client, as it could potentially be life threating. Imagine having a carer who has no epilepsy training, not administering a PRN medication to the client because they didn’t know how or were aware they needed to.