Final Report on RREF 2001 - Department of Health

Part B: Development of Options for a Revised RREF
STEP 2: OPTIONS FOR VARIABLES FOR RECOGNISING NEED IN THE
RREF
The failure to take account of factors other than age that affect the need for HACC
services in local populations is a major shortcoming in the current RREF. The
Consultation Paper posed three questions to canvass the variables that needed to be
considered to address this shortcoming.
1. What factors affecting prevalence of handicap and need for HACC services, in
addition to age, should be considered for inclusion in the RREF?
2. What are the strengths and limitations of composite indexes of socio-economic
disadvantage compared to other specific variables?
3. How should factors affecting those born in non-English speaking countries, Koori
communities and geographic factors such as remoteness be dealt with in the
funding distribution formula?
2.1 RANGE AND NATURE OF NEED VARIABLES
A total of 29 variables were suggested in the Round 1 Consultations. As well as 27 single
variables, two composite indexes were noted, namely the Index of Relative Socio-Economic
Disadvantage (IRSED) and the Accessibility/Remoteness Index for Australia (ARIA). These
variables are grouped and listed under five dimensions of need in Box 1. The eight variables
shown in bold in Chart 2 have already been considered in the options for the RREF Base
Population options in Step 1, leaving 20 variables for consideration.
Three aspects of the nature of need variables to be considered for inclusion in the RREF warrant
comment:
1. The range of need variables proposed for consideration are indicators of
broad dimensions of functioning and well-being, not direct measures of
need for HACC services. If such direct measures were available, it
would not be necessary to consider the array of variables that are
canvassed here. Further, the variables are used in the RREF as
indicators of relative need, not absolute levels of need.
2. The availability of data, and the quality of that data, change over time.
Any variables can only be measured with data available at a given time,
but the continuing development of indicators of health and well-being,
and improvements in data collection, means there is potential for
change in the variables included in the RREF in the future. This
potential for incorporating new variables and updated and improved
data sources as they become available make the RREF a dynamic
formula that will be modified following the next census in August 2001
and again after the next DAC Survey scheduled for 2003, and in the
light of further developments in the measures such as the Burden of
Disease and other indexes of well-being.
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