Most aged care providers can describe their services in detail, but far fewer can describe their consumers with the same confidence — who they really are, how they make decisions, and what shapes their experience from first awareness through to ongoing care. The default assumption is often that the consumer is just the older person in front of you. It's usually more complicated than that.

The aged care consumer in 2026 isn't a single profile. Decisions often move through families with different priorities and unequal dynamics — 90% of older people in a recent Australian study arrived at their home care assessment with a nominated decision-supporter, even when they had full capacity to decide alone. Cultural diversity is shifting too: 37% of older Australians were born overseas, and 18% speak a language other than English at home. And consumers are arriving more informed — 66% of families say online reviews shape their decision, and transparency reforms now let anyone see how a provider spends its money.

None of this is new information in isolation. What's new is the combination, and the pace it's changing at.

That's what we're covering on Tuesday 19 May, 10am ACST. A live Q&A with Elyssia Clark (Benetas), Justina Gardiner (LightSpeed Consulting), and Hanaa' Grave (culturalQ) on who's actually making aged care decisions in 2026, how cultural diversity shapes the consumer base, and where AI fits.

PS: I'm at the Invox Support at Home Conference in Melbourne today and tomorrow — come say hi.

Most aged care organisations I talk to already have AI somewhere in the business. Someone on the team is using ChatGPT or Claude. The board has asked about it. The care management vendor has mentioned a new feature. Where it all adds up is usually unclear.

I've been using a simple framework to make sense of it. Three tiers, and most organisations sit somewhere between tiers one and two, often further along at tier one than they realise.

Tier 1 — Generic AI Tools. Staff use ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot or Gemini alongside whatever systems they already use. The systems don't change; people just have a new helper on the side.

Tier 2 — Custom AI for your organisation. AI moves off the individual and onto one of your systems — either as a feature built into software you already use, or a custom assistant trained on your own policies and templates.

Tier 3 — Integrated AI suite. AI wraps around the whole picture, connecting care management, HR, finance and rostering. This is where claims integrity, operational reporting and real-time anomaly detection start to become plausible.

Each tier has different costs, different privacy considerations, and a different sensible next step. And the useful thing about the framework isn't picking the "right" tier — it's being honest about where you actually are.

👉 I've written up the full version on my website, with diagrams of how most aged care organisations look before AI enters the picture, what changes at each tier, and what to ask your existing vendors before you spend a dollar more.

NEW | Thursday 14 May | 9am–12:30pm ACST | In-person | Marion Hotel & Cellars, Mitchell Park SA

I'll be delivering this half-day workshop for Southern Services Reform Group, designed for CHSP providers working with culturally diverse clients, families and teams. It moves past cultural awareness into practical frameworks you can apply the same week — communication strategies, trust-building, and tools for navigating diverse situations in care settings and inside your own teams. Aligned to Standards 1, 2 and 3 of the Strengthened Aged Care Standards. Staff at all levels welcome.

6–7 May | Royal International Convention Centre, Brisbane

I'll be part of the closing session — a fishbowl-style panel called "Aged Care 2076: Wild Predictions and Bold Ideas" with Sanka Amadoru (Geriatrician, Aria Health) and Dan Aitchison (CEO, Palm Lake Care). We're throwing out the rulebook and jumping 50 years into the future to imagine what aged care in Australia could look like in 2076. Expect provocation, energy, and a few ideas that will either inspire you or make you nervous.

Ageing Australia released its first Community Expectations Report earlier this month. The headline finding is quite telling: Australians are more than twice as likely to trust aged care once they have direct experience of it. 71% of those who had actually used aged care services were satisfied. 88% of residents, in the separately conducted Residents' Experience Survey, would recommend their home to others. The full report is worth reading alongside any conversation about consumer trust, communications, or marketing strategy.

Libby Houston is a poet and botanist who has published several poetry collections and discovered several whitebeam tree species, including a rare silver-leaved one now named Houston's whitebeam. At 80, she still climbs the limestone walls of Bristol's Avon Gorge to reach cliff faces others can't. In this short documentary, Libby reflects on her life, the death of her first husband, and how her poetry and science feed each other — her quest to document every whitebeam in the gorge a quiet reminder that even well-studied landscapes still hold surprises.

A study published last month analysed Finnish health registry data covering more than 374,000 people. They found that severe, hospital-treated infections — particularly UTIs — are independently associated with roughly a 20% higher risk of developing dementia, even after adjusting for 27 other dementia-related conditions. On average, these infections occurred five to six years before diagnosis. For early-onset dementia, the association was stronger and extended to pneumonia and dental caries.

The third clip from last month's expert panel is on data sovereignty — a question I get asked in almost every conversation about AI adoption.

Dr George Margelis and Peter Kokinakos unpack where resident data actually goes when you use AI tools — why "stored in a local data centre" can still mean Singapore, why public AI tools almost always push data offshore by default, and which questions to ask vendors if you want a different answer.

Gamma has added a Smart Diagrams feature that lets you build diagrams quickly. Here's roughly what I did to make the loneliness loop diagram below:

The main thing I'd pass on: spend your time on the words and the steps you need. Gamma handles the layout once the thinking is clear.

This works for any diagram you can describe in plain language — flow charts, org charts, process maps, timelines, the lot.

[Sign up here for an extra 200 free credits]

Each week, I review developments in ageing and aged care and what they mean in practice. If this was useful, forward it to someone in the sector who'd appreciate it.

George Gouzounis