A team of researchers from the Caring Futures Institute will work to address the housing needs of adults with intellectual disability, after winning valuable funding support from the Australian Research Council (ARC).
To address growing numbers of older people with intellectual disability outliving their parent carers, Associate Professor Ruth Walker, Dr Fiona Rillotta and Dr Claire Hutchinson are part of a team investigating “Post-parental housing transitions among adults with intellectual disability” (LP200200326, worth $319,061).
The team was one of three Flinders research teams that collectively obtained more than $921,000 in research funding and were among 65 new Australian research projects to receive ARC Linkage Projects grants, announced by the Federal Minister for Education and Youth Alan Tudge.
The Caring Futures Institute project aims to find a solution that will ensure successful post-parental housing and care transitions, especially considering that many ageing parent carers have not put future care plans in place for their adult children with intellectual disability.
In 2019, Associate Professor Ruth Walker led research that found specific planning for the future care of adults with intellectual disability after the death of their parents is lacking.
A/P Walker says the new project aims to develop an Australian-first evidence-based resource kit for planning post-parental housing and care transitions, providing significant benefits for older people with intellectual disability, their family carers and the disability sector.
“It’s an important issue facing many older parents of adults with intellectual disability, many of whom have reported feeling uncertain about what the future holds for their son or daughter when they are no longer able to provide care and support,” she says.
Partners in the project are National Disability Services Ltd, Bedford Phoenix, SA Health and Genu Ability.
Exploring Aboriginal rock art in the upper Murray region and improving home environments for young people in state care are the focus of the other two Flinders University research projects that won the support of the ARC.