How Porter Lodge, a residential aged care home in Minto is supporting independence and choice.
Most people value agency and choice and that doesn’t change as we get older. In fact, The Catalyst Report: Residential Aged Care 2024 found seven in ten are discouraged from aged care because they want to remain independent.
At Anglicare, our model for person-centred care, Rhythm of Life® is designed to support residents to maintain their independence. At Porter Lodge, staff take the time to understand what matters most to each resident, listening closely and providing support to help them continue to do the things they enjoy, in the way that suits them best.
For one resident that might mean spending their mornings in the garden, for another they may prefer to head out and go for a walk. This is what residential aged care in Minto can feel like when independence is encouraged and each person is empowered to live the way they prefer. But don’t take our word for it. The people who call Porter Lodge home say it best.
Residential aged care that supports choice and independence
Peggy, a resident at Porter Lodge, values that freedom. “It’s up to yourself… if I don’t feel up to going to bingo, then I just don’t go,” she says. Her choice to move to Porter Lodge was also hers alone. “I came here on my own accord. My family didn’t make me come.”
Brian echoes the same feeling. He and his wife decided to move together when she began experiencing the early signs of dementia. “We came here voluntarily. We chose to,” he says. ”
“You can choose to do any activity you want,” says Hani, a member of the care team. That mindset runs throughout the home, with encouragement to go about your day in ways that feel good for you.
And once you’ve moved in, what happens next looks a little different for everyone.
Peggy enjoys the social side of things. “One activity I really look forward to… bingo and playing cards with my friends,” she says. “It’s the company with the friends.”
Another resident, Clementine, likes to stay active and connected in her own way. “Every day is a fun day,” she says. “It’s up to you to be happy, sad, unwilling, or whatever. But most of the time, I’m a happy person.”
For Brian, the garden is where he finds his rhythm. When Hani took the time to find out what activities he enjoyed doing, he said gardening. So they drove to Bunnings, picked out some plants and supplies, and came back to start a communal garden. “He’s the boss of that,” she says. He now grows lettuce, herbs, and tomatoes. He has given over 300 bags of vegetables to the kitchen, to the staff, to other residents. He expanded the garden to another level of the home. “Now he’s independent. [It’s] his garden,” Hani says. “I’m very happy he’s happy.”
A place where you can build connections
Peggy has made good friends at Porter Lodge. “Quite a few,” she smiles. Brian values the people around him, too. “If you’ve made one friend in your life, you’re lucky. I’ve made half a dozen here,” he says. “[They] are genuine friendships.”
Tina sees that same sense of connection across cultures and personalities. “The lady across from me, she’s Croatian. Two doors up, she’s Asian. We all get on well. It’s respect, you know? Just respect.”
These relationships aren’t structured or scheduled but they naturally grow over time through everyday interactions, shared interests, and simply being around one another.
“We all get on so well together,” says Tina “We get our glasses of wine… lunches out on the verandah, and us girls, we had our girly get-together and sit outside and enjoy it.”
Put simply, friendship at Porter Lodge doesn’t look one way. It looks like choice, shared interest, and comfort in each other’s company.
A true feeling of home
Moving into a new home can come with mixed feelings. For some, that sense of home happens quickly. For others, it takes a little longer. Brian remembers his turning point. “At first, it didn’t feel like home. Then at Christmas, my son took me out. And when I came back, I said, this is home. I wanted to be back.”
For him, feeling at home comes from a variety of things. “Being happy in [my] environment, happy with the people, knowing that you’re cared for properly, and knowing you’re caring for yourself properly,” he says. And he’s now found that at Porter Lodge.
Tina puts it simply. “It’s my home… I’m well looked after… I feel very blessed that I live in Porter Lodge.”
Support is available when you need it
Peggy appreciates how well she’ looked after at Porter Lodge. “I can’t praise [the staff] enough,” she says. “I ask for things, I get them. The carers, the lifestyle team, the volunteers – I’m quite happy about the way they treat me.”
Hani has been at Porter Lodge since the day it opened, and says she “loves [her] job” and feels like it’s her home, too. "Porter Lodge to me, it's my home. It’s [a] very welcoming home and a beautiful home."
Support isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. Sometimes it means noticing what matters to someone and doing what you can to make it happen. For one resident, she wanted to see Tom Jones live. So a staff member went out of her way to make it happen, even though, as Brian puts it, “it was outside her realm of responsibilities.”
“What I can genuinely say [about] this home is that the staff do care. They… go out of their way to accommodate any requests,” he says.
What real care feels like
At Porter Lodge, care doesn’t just mean help when you need it. It means listening, noticing, and making space for the things that bring people joy.
It’s a staff member organising tickets for someone to see their favourite singer, or helping a resident start a garden from scratch. It’s assurance that your needs matter, and your preferences are heard.
People arrive at Porter Lodge with different stories, different needs, and different ideas of what a good day looks like. Some people want quiet, some people want community. Some residents want structure, and others want independence and freedom. The care team knows that and works alongside each resident to help them keep doing what’s important to them.
So, what does residential aged care in Minto look like when independence and having a choice are encouraged?
It looks like a garden full of tomatoes, a bingo game among friends, a verandah lunch with wine and laughter, and the comfort of feeling at home.
Porter Lodge isn’t the same for everyone, and that’s what makes it special.
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