u/OrieRusso

My father in law is in a residential aged care facility in Tasmania. We live in Sydney and are planning to move him up to be closer to us as he’s just been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. So we’re beginning the process of looking at aged care facilities in Sydney and I was wondering if anyone has been through this before and has any advice.

He has no assets and currently pays the base daily rate which is about 85% of his pension. Many of the for-profit providers have prices on their websites (in the millions) which he/we can’t afford. What are the options in cases where someone can’t pay that price? In Tasmania you just pay the base rate - is it the same in Sydney?

When we went through the process of finding him a bed in Tassie there was an excellent organisation called Care2Serve which has visibility of the available beds - is there an organisation like that for NSW?

My mum just passed away and among her effects we found a record that she may have given a baby up for adoption in 1964 when she was 15. I have no record of the date of birth or the father’s name, or the hospital or baby’s name or adoptive parents or anything.

All I have is that she was from Melbourne (and her name of course). What are the chances we might be able to find them now? It’s not looking good is it? Just typing that out makes me thing we’ve got buckleys.

Does anyone have any advice for me? Thanks in advance.