Staying at home shouldn’t mean being at risk

The runner in the hallway had been there since 1998. It was the first thing you saw walking in, faded blue, curling at one corner, the corner everyone in the family had tripped on at least once and laughed about.

Then one Tuesday in June, Dad tripped on it and didn’t laugh. He lay on the floorboards for forty minutes before the neighbour heard him. The rug cost eleven dollars to fix, a strip of double-sided tape and ten minutes. The fall cost him nine days in hospital, most of his confidence, and a conversation with his children he had spent three years avoiding.

We tell this story because it is astonishingly ordinary. Falls are the leading cause of injury hospitalisation and injury death among Australians aged 65 and over. Roughly one in two of those hospitalised falls happens at home. And most are not dramatic. Six in ten are same-level slips, trips and stumbles. Not ladders. Not roofs. A rug, a step, a wet tile, a cord.

Many older Australians tell us the same thing: I want to stay here. That is not stubbornness, it’s a legitimate care plan, and with the right support behind it, an excellent one. Home is where the routine lives, where the neighbours know your car, where you sleep properly. The question is not whether staying home is safe. It’s whether this home, as it is arranged today, is still the right fit for the person living in it.

Homes don’t age with us. The lighting that was fine at fifty is not enough at eighty, when the eye needs roughly three times more light to see the same edge. The step down to the laundry that never registered now sits at the exact height of a tired foot. Nothing broke. The person changed, and the house didn’t get the memo.

As Australia’s population ages, it’s important that as a community we make the necessary adjustments to ensure our loved ones can continue to live comfortably and safely within their own homes. Take the first step in this transition by ensuring the home of someone you care about is fit for purpose.