Medication Support

Not all medication support is the same. There are three distinct levels and each has different requirements.

Level 1 — Prompting: the support worker reminds you that it is time to take your medication. They do not handle the medication. This can be delivered by any trained support worker.

Level 2 — Assistance: the support worker assists you to take your medication — for example, opening child-proof packaging, extracting tablets from a blister pack, or handing you a glass of water. The participant takes the medication themselves. This requires a support worker who has completed medication assistance training.

Level 3 — Administration: the support worker actively administers the medication — for example, applying a prescribed cream, managing enteral feeding, or other tasks where the worker physically delivers the medication rather than assisting the participant to take it themselves. This requires specific clinical training, a signed off competency assessment by a qualified health practitioner, and an individual medication management plan.

Before any medication support is delivered, we develop an individual medication management plan in consultation with you and your healthcare team — your GP, specialist, or pharmacist as relevant. The plan records every medication you take, the dose, the time, the route of administration, any known interactions or side effects to monitor, and what to do if a dose is missed or an error occurs.

The plan is signed by the prescribing health professional and reviewed whenever your medications change. No support worker delivers medication support without a current, signed plan on file. The plan is stored securely and accessible to the support workers assigned to you — and to no one else.

Every time medication support is delivered, the support worker records it in a Medication Administration Record — known as a MAR. The record shows the date, the time, the medication, the dose, the worker's initials, and any exceptions or observations.

The MAR is a legal document. It cannot be altered after the fact. If a dose is missed, the reason is recorded. If a participant refuses medication, this is recorded without judgement. If an error occurs, it is recorded immediately and reported through our incident management process — including to the NDIS Commission if the error meets the threshold for a reportable incident.

Medication errors are taken seriously. If a worker makes an error — administering the wrong dose, giving medication at the wrong time, or missing a dose — the following steps occur immediately: the worker notifies their supervisor, the incident is recorded in our incident register, you and your emergency contact are notified, and where clinically appropriate the worker contacts your GP or a health professional for guidance.

If the error meets the threshold for a reportable incident under the NDIS Incidents and Reportable Incidents Rules 2020, we notify the NDIS Commission within 24 hours. You are kept informed throughout.

We do not minimise medication errors. The correct response to an error is transparency, immediate action, and a review of the process that allowed it to occur.

Only workers who have completed specific medication training and been assessed as competent can deliver medication assistance or administration. Competency is assessed by a qualified health professional — not by a manager or colleague — and is recorded in the worker's personnel file.

Competency is assessed for each level of support and, for Level 3 administration, is specific to the individual participant and their medication type. A worker assessed as competent to prompt medication is not thereby qualified to administer it. A worker qualified to administer oral medication is not thereby qualified to manage enteral feeding without specific additional training.

You can ask us to confirm the specific qualification of any worker assigned to deliver medication support to you.