Gippsland Lakes Complete Health (GLCH) is celebrating a major milestone this month, marking 30 years of delivering home care services that have helped thousands of local residents remain independent, connected and well in their own homes.
As the organisation reflects on three decades of community care, three familiar faces are celebrating right alongside it.
Carol Keighran, Carol Blanford and Marjorie Answer all transferred to GLCH from the former East Gippsland Shire Council in July 1996, back when Home and Community Care services moved to what was then the Lakes Entrance Community Health Centre. Thirty years later, all three remain integral members of the team.
Together, they have witnessed an extraordinary evolution in regional care delivery — transitioning from handwritten A3 rosters, carbon-copy timesheets, and landline telephone tag to modern mobile apps and real-time digital client information systems.
The July 1996 transition represented one of the most significant periods of growth in the organisation’s history, instantly expanding its regional footprint and bringing more than 100 staff into the fold. Almost overnight, GLCH’s budget increased by approximately 30 per cent as it took on responsibility for Home and Community Care alongside Maternal and Child Health services.
At the centre of that historic expansion was 27 Riverine Street in Bairnsdale. The long-standing medical clinic site was purchased by GLCH in July 1996 and reopened just one month later as the new hub for the expanded services.
In that defining first year, a team of roughly 100 home care workers delivered more than 38,000 hours of domestic assistance to just over 700 East Gippsland residents.
Today, the scale of care has grown exponentially. The GLCH Home and Community Support Services team now supports 2264 clients, delivering more than 97,000 hours of care annually across programs including Support at Home, the Commonwealth Home Support Programme, NDIS, Veterans’ Home Care, post-acute care, and fee-for-service supports.
Executive manager of home and community support services, Penny Cassidy, said the anniversary is a perfect opportunity to celebrate both the growth of the service and the dedicated people behind it.
“Over the past 30 years we’ve seen enormous changes in the way community care is delivered, but what hasn’t changed is the importance of helping people live independently and with dignity in the place they call home,” Ms. Cassidy said.
“This milestone belongs to the hundreds of community support workers, coordinators, volunteers, and care professionals who have dedicated their careers to helping others.”
For long-serving staff members Ms Keighran, Ms Blanford, and Ms Answer, the anniversary brings back vivid memories of the early days when scheduling required pens, rulers, and bottles of correction fluid.
Before mobile phones, contacting a care worker out on the road often meant ringing a client’s home landline and asking to speak with the staff member directly.
“Transferring from the East Gippsland Shire was the easy part,” Ms Answer said.
“It’s all the new technology that’s challenged me over the years. But caring for our clients is what has kept me here.”
Ms Blanford noted that the nature of the care itself has grown far more comprehensive.
“When we first started, most of our work centred around domestic assistance, with only a small number of personal care clients,” she said.
“Today, we support people through a much broader range of services, supporting people to remain independent in their own homes has been a privilege.”
GLCH chief executive officer Anne-Maree Kaser extended her gratitude to the generations of staff who have upheld this vital local legacy.
“For 30 years, our home care teams have helped local people maintain their independence, stay connected to their communities, and continue living life on their own terms,” Ms Kaser said.
“As demand for care in the home continues to grow, we remain committed to helping people age well, maintain their dignity, and receive the support they need in the place they most want to be — at home.”
