Community nursing in Melbourne, at home and on your terms.

It depends on why you need it. The NDIS funds nursing when the need comes from your disability, for example catheter care after a spinal injury or pressure wound care. Treatment for a health condition unrelated to your disability, such as a chest infection, stays with Medicare, your GP and the hospital. We help you work out which applies.

Yes, and it is one of the most useful things we do. A registered nurse assesses the task and the risk, writes a procedure specific to you, trains and signs off each worker in person, then refreshes that training on a schedule. Our sign-off follows the NDIS Commission's high intensity support skills descriptors. Workers who are not yet competent do not do the task.

The NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission publishes skills descriptors for high intensity daily personal activities: complex bowel care, enteral feeding, dysphagia, ventilation, tracheostomy, urinary catheters, subcutaneous injections and complex wound care. Each describes what a support worker needs to know and do to deliver that support safely without being a health practitioner. Our nurses train and sign off workers against them, and you can ask to see them.

Both are registered with the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia. A registered nurse holds a degree, assesses and plans care independently, and supervises enrolled nurses. An enrolled nurse holds a diploma and works under a registered nurse's direction, delivering much of the hands-on care. Many routine visits suit an enrolled nurse at a lower price limit, and we match the nurse to the task.

Once we have the referral, the plan details and your consent, the assessment visit is usually within days, and urgent care begins at that visit. Hospital discharges come first: if the ward refers early, a nurse can be at your home on the day you leave. We do not quote fixed waiting times, because they depend on where you live and what the care involves; we give you a date and keep it.

Yes, where the wound relates to your disability or to the equipment and positioning it requires, which is usually so with pressure injuries. The nurse assesses the wound, chooses dressings, sets a visit schedule, photographs and measures progress, and works with your GP or wound clinic. If a wound is not healing, we say so early and ask for specialist review rather than continuing to dress it.

We can set up and check dose administration aids, administer injections including insulin and depot medications, monitor for side effects and keep an accurate medication chart that your GP, pharmacist and support workers work from. Prescription changes stay with your doctor; we do not alter doses. If the NDIS does not fund medication support in your case, we say so and point you to the right Medicare or pharmacy service.

Yes. Our nurses provide clinical oversight in Newdawn's supported independent living homes and in homes run by other providers who ask. That includes assessing residents, writing health care plans and training rostered workers in high intensity tasks. For people with complex mental health needs it also means watching for physical health problems that are easy to miss.