“Finding qualified home care for ventilator dependent adults and children, including NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) accredited.”

My name is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecareathome.com, where we provide tailor-made solutions for long-term ventilated adults and children with tracheostomies, where we also provide home care for BIPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure), CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) ventilation without tracheostomy, tracheostomy without ventilation, cough assist management at home, ventilation weaning management at home, Home TPN (Total Parenteral Nutrition), home IV potassium, home IV magnesium, home IV antibiotic infusions, central line, PICC (Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter) line, Hickman’s line, port management at home, PEG (Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy), PEJ (Percutaneous Endoscopic Jejunostomy) tube, nasogastric tube, nasojejunostomy tube management at home, including palliative care at home.

So today, I have a question from a reader who says:

“Hi Patrik,

I’m looking for a qualified accredited chronic ventilator dependent home care solution for my husband.”

Well, you have come to the right place because finding a qualified accredited chronic ventilator dependent homecare solution for your husband is absolutely crucial, and it’s exactly what we do. We don’t do anything else really, and I want to make sure you understand exactly what to look for and how we can help you navigate this challenging situation for your husband and for yourself, of course.

So first of all, you need to understand chronic ventilator dependent home care. When your husband is chronically ventilator dependent, you need more than just standard home care services and people coming in and out. You need specialized mechanical ventilation home care that’s delivered by highly trained critical care registered nurses who understand the complexities of long-term ventilator management, tracheostomy care, and the needs of patients requiring continuous respiratory and ventilation support.

So, what makes a homecare provider qualified for a ventilated and tracheostomy patients? Well, I’m glad you’ve asked because here’s what you absolutely must look for:

1. Proper accreditation and registration

It’s non-negotiable, you need a provider with proper accreditation standards. At intensivecareathome.com, we’re proud to be the only provider in Australia in 2025 that’s fully accredited and registered and certified for Intensive Care at Home nursing. No other provider has achieved that level of accreditation in Australia in 2025. We’re not only fully NDIS registered and accredited, we’re also fully ISO 9001:2015 accredited and registered.

No other provider in the country in 2025 has achieved that level of accreditation. No other provider has the policies, the procedures, the know-how, the intellectual property, as well as the staff to make this happen, which means we meet the highest standards for quality and safety in delivering complex care and intensive care services at home, including ventilator and tracheostomy management, which includes:

2. Evidence-based protocols

Your husband’s care must follow current evidence-based guidelines for Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines. We follow evidence-based and comprehensive Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines to ensure safe, effective respiratory support in the home environment.

3. Specialized nursing staff

You need critical care registered nurses with ICU or extensive ER (emergency room) or ED (emergency department) experience and critical care nursing experience, who are specifically trained in ventilation management, tracheostomy management, deep suctioning, for example, not just general home care nurses.

Our team has extensive intensive care nursing backgrounds, and understands the nuances of caring for ventilation and tracheostomy dependent patients. It takes years of training and expertise and experience. Like I said, we are employing hundreds of years of intensive care nursing experience combined in the community. No other provider in 2025 in Australia employs a higher skill level in the community than we do.

4. 24/7 support capability

Chronic ventilator dependent patients with or without a tracheostomy require 24/7 specialized nursing care with critical care nurses. As per the evidence-based Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines, you need a provider who can offer continuous nursing support and has emergency protocols in place.

So, what are the key services that we provide for ventilator dependent home care? As a qualified provider and any other qualified providers, if there are any, should deliver on:

1. Ventilation management and monitoring, daily checks, hourly checks, settings, adjustments, troubleshooting, arterial blood gases, I-STAT blood gases, and so forth.
2. Tracheostomy care, including suctioning tube changes, and stoma care.
3. Respiratory assessments, of course, continuous monitoring of oxygen levels, breathing patterns, and lung function.
4. Emergency responses, immediate intervention for ventilation alarms, desaturations or respiratory distress.
5. Equipment maintenance, ensuring all ventilator and tracheostomy equipment is functioning properly.
6. Coordination with medical teams working closely with your husband’s doctors, respiratory physicians, pulmonologists, and any other specialists.

We have our own intensive care specialist if you want access to that. Also, working with allied-health, physiotherapists, allied occupational therapists, speech therapists, and so forth.

Why does NDIS registration matter, or any other accreditation and specialization? Being NDIS or ISO registered and accredited means we’ve been thoroughly vetted and meet strict quality standards. This gives you confidence in the quality of care, access to NDIS funding if eligible, assurance that staff are properly trained and background checked, protection through regular audits and compliance checks, clear pathways for feedback and complaints.

So, what’s the Intensive Care at Home difference? What sets us apart in providing ventilator dependent homecare and tracheostomy care at home is our intensive care nursing background. We’re not just a standard home care agency trying to manage complex respiratory ventilated tracheostomy patients. We’re critical care and ICU specialists in the home who bring intensive care and ICU level care into the home environment 24/7, so that you and your family can stop living in ICU. We understand ventilation modes. We know how to respond to emergencies. We’re comfortable with high acuity patients, and we have the clinical expertise to keep your husband safe and your family safe and comfortable at home.

For any hospitals or funding bodies watching this, we are cutting the cost of the intensive care bed by over 50%, which means we’re cutting your costs by over 50%. It’s a win-win situation. Also, for the hospitals, we’re freeing up your ICU bed, that I know you need after having worked in intensive care nursing for over 25 years. You need the intensive care, it’s a win-win situation altogether.

Now, let’s quickly look again at evidence-based nursing care protocols. Following proper and evidence-based Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines isn’t optional, it’s essential for your husband’s safety.

These evidence-based protocols cover patient selection criteria for home ventilation, equipment requirements and specifications, monitoring and assessment schedules, hourly ventilation operation and the interpretation of such, emergency procedures and contingency plans, staff training and competency requirements, infection control measures, quality indicators and outcome monitoring, questions to ask potential homecare providers.

When you’re evaluating options, make sure you ask: Are you NDIS registered and accredited? Are you accredited for Intensive Care at Home nursing? What specific experience do your nurses have with ventilated patients? Are they critical care trained nurses? Do you follow evidence-based Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines that we publish on our website at intensivecareathome.com? What’s your nurse to patient ratio for ventilator dependent clients? How do you handle emergencies and after hours support? Can you provide references from other families with ventilator dependent loved ones? What equipment do you provide versus what we need to source? And how do you coordinate with our medical team?

Also, ask them if they believe in a delegated model of care that’s trying to be imposed by the NDIS, where support workers are meant to look after basically, critical care patients, and many patients have died because of that flawed model of care. It’s a deadly model of care as a matter of fact, and I have all the evidence to provide that to anyone who wants to question it.

Now, how do you get started with ventilator home care and with Intensive Care at Home? The process typically involves initial assessment. We’ll evaluate your husband’s needs, ventilator requirements, home environment and support needs, and care plan development. We’ll create a comprehensive plan following evidence-based guidelines and tailored to your husband’s specific situations, and we of course, create that care plan with you and your husband. Staff allocation, staff selection, we’ll match you with the right critical care trained nurses who have the right experience and training, and you can be involved in staff selection.

Equipment set up, we’ll ensure all necessary equipment is in place and functioning properly, and ongoing monitoring. We’ll continuously assess and adjust the care plan as needed, and then, of course, we help you with funding options for ventilator home care. Depending on your situation, funding might come from NDIS if your husband is below the age of 65, private health insurance self-funding, Department of Veteran Affairs (DVA), could come from the Department of Health, could come from hospitals directly, state-based disability programs, and could be a combination of funding sources.

As an NDIS registered provider, we can help navigate the NDIS system if that’s appropriate for your situation. We also offer Level 2 and Level 3 NDIS support coordination.

So, why home care for long-term ventilated adults and children with tracheostomies or without tracheostomies, or for tracheostomies without ventilation, instead of staying in hospitals and in ICU long-term? You might be wondering if home is really the right place for someone who’s chronically ventilator dependent with or without a tracheostomy, for someone who has a tracheostomy without ventilation.

The evidence is crystal clear. It shows that when done properly, with qualified staff and following proper guidelines, home mechanical ventilation and Intensive Care at Home offers a much better quality of life, reduced risk of hospital acquired infections, more comfortable, familiar environment, greater independence and dignity, family involvement in care, lower overall healthcare costs, and improved psychological well-being.

Here is how to take the next steps. I understand this is completely overwhelming, I completely understand that, and finding the right care for your ventilator dependent husband is one of the most important decisions you’ll ever make. You need an experienced provider with a proven track record who’s not just qualified on paper, but has the real world experience to handle complex respiratory care safely at home.

At Intensive Care at Home, we’re here to support you every step of the way. We’re NDIS registered, we’re ISO accredited, we follow evidence-based Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines, and most importantly, we have the 24/7 clinical nursing expertise to give your husband the intensive care level support he needs in the comfort of his own home to live a much better quality of life.

If you’re ready to discuss your husband’s ventilator homecare needs, go to intensivecareathome.com, learn more about our service, check out our accreditation status and review our evidence-based Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines, and of course, call us directly to speak with myself, for critical care nurse coordinators who can answer your questions, and arrange an initial assessment.

Subscribe to my YouTube channel for more tips on managing complex homecare situations and navigating the healthcare system. Have a look at our Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines on our website at Intensive Care at Home because the sooner we can assess your situation, the sooner we can get the right support in place for your husband.

You and your husband and your family deserve peace of mind, knowing he’s receiving qualified accredited evidence-based care at home.

Now, with Intensive Care at Home, we are currently sending our ICU and critical care nurses into the home, 24 hours a day. We are providing the following:

• Home care services for ventilated adults & children with tracheostomies  with critical care nurses 24 hours a day
• Genuine alternative to a long-term stay in intensive care or at long-term acute care
• Tracheostomy care for clients without ventilation
• Home care services for patients on non-invasive ventilation such as Home BIPAP (Bilevel Positive Airway Pressure), Home CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure)
• Home TPN (Total Parenteral Nutrition), which is also known as IV nutrition
• Home IV potassium and home IV magnesium infusions, IV fluids, and IV antibiotics
• Providing central line management, PICC (Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter) line management, Hickman’s line management, as well as port management at home.
• Providing nasogastric tube  and PEG (Percutaneous Endoscopic Gastrostomy) tube management at home
• Use cough assist machines for our clients for airway clearance at home
• Palliative care services at home
• Ventilator weaning at home

We’re also sending our critical care nurses into the home for emergency department bypass services. We have done so successfully as part of the Western Sydney Local Area Health District, their in-touch program, saving approximately $2,000 per patient that we keep at home, instead of them going to an emergency department.

That also means, we’re also in a position to cut the cost of an intensive care bed by around 50%. An intensive care bed costs between $5,000 to $6,000 per bed day. Our services costs between $2,500 to $3,000 per bed day, and we’re freeing up the most sought-after bed in the hospital, which is the ICU bed. Most importantly, we’re improving the quality of life for patients and their families, which is a win-win situation for all stakeholders. Of course, quality of life is much improved surrounded by families and by a team of dedicated intensive care nurses in the home care setting instead of in an intensive care unit.

With Intensive Care at Home, we are currently operating all around Australia in all major capital cities as well as in all regional and rural areas. We work with NDIS (National Disability Insurance Scheme) clients all around Australia, TAC (Transport Accident Commission) and WorkSafe in Victoria, Department of Veteran Affairs (DVA) all around Australia. Our clients and we, as a service provider, have also received funding through public hospitals, private health funds, as well as Departments of Health.

We are having policies and procedures for Intensive Care at Home nursing and we’ve built all the intellectual property for Intensive Care at Home since 2012. No other provider in Australia has created more intellectual property when it comes to Intensive Care at Home nursing than we have. This puts us in a position to employ hundreds of years of critical care nursing experience combined in the community. No other service provider in 2025 employs a higher skill level in the community than we do, which enables us to look after the highest acuity adults and children in the community in Australia safely.

If you’re at home already and you’re watching this, or you’re stuck in an ICU long-term, or if you’re going to the hospital and ED all the time, and you realize that you don’t have the right level of support at home, or if you are stuck in an ICU, I’ll give you a real-world example today, how we can help you.

One of our first clients when we first got started in 2012 was a client who was at home initially on a ventilator with a tracheostomy with a support worker model 24/7. Of course, support workers are not equipped to look after a client at home on a ventilator with a tracheostomy. That is dangerous and it’s simply negligent. Having support workers looking after a client at home on a ventilator with a tracheostomy is like flying the airplane with a cabin crew instead of the pilot. Because anyone on a ventilator with a tracheostomy is at very high risk of medical emergencies 24/7, or even at high risk of dying if they don’t have a team of dedicated critical care nurses looking after them 24/7 at home. This is actually evidence-based and is documented in our Mechanical Home Ventilation Guidelines that you can find on our website at intensivecareathome.com.

Think about it, in an intensive care unit in a hospital, you wouldn’t have support workers looking after your critically ill loved one or after any critically ill patient on a ventilator with a tracheostomy. So, why would anyone in their right mind do that in the home care environment in the community?

So, this client at the time found out about us eventually, and the ICU that he was basically living in also knew about us and eventually reached out to us. We were proving our concept with this client very fast. When we worked with this particular client, we sent him critical care nurses, 24 hours a day. He never ever went back into ICU ever again, as long as we were working with this client.

We can do the same for you if you’re not safe at home and help you with keeping you at home predictably. Otherwise, we would not be in business. Again, the same is applicable for those stuck in an ICU, similar to this case study that I’ve just given you, or if you’re going back to ED all the time, please reach out to us. We can help you with taking you through the right steps, including how to get funding with different funding bodies.

This is also why we are providing NDIS Support Coordination. We have a team of NDIS Support Coordinators, and they have a wealth of knowledge. I’ve done an interview with Amanda Riches (one of our NDIS support coordinators, and I’ll put a link to an interview with Amanda in the written version of this blog. We’re also providing TAC case management and WorkSafe case management in Victoria with Lucy McCotter.

If you’re an NDIS support coordinator or a case manager from another organization watching this, and you’re looking for nursing care for your participants, please reach out to us as well. If you need more evidence for nursing care, we are also writing NDIS nursing assessments with legal nurse critical care consulting nurses.

If you are a critical care nurse and you’re looking for a career change and you want to join a very progressive, dynamic, and high performing team of critical care nurses in the community, we’re employing hundreds of years of critical care nursing experience combined. You can join this high performing team if you are a critical care nurse.

If you are looking for a career change as a critical care nurse, we’re currently hiring for jobs for critical care nurses in Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, in Albury, Wodonga, in Bendigo, in Geelong, in Warragul in Victoria. If you have worked in critical care nursing for a minimum of 2 years pediatric ICU, ED, and you have already completed a postgraduate critical care nursing qualification, we will be delighted hearing from you.

I do have a disclaimer though, because we are offering a tailor-made solution for our clients, which includes regular staff, our clients also do want the same staff coming over and over again because they are so vulnerable and so special. That’s why we need regular staff. So, if you’re looking for agency work, where you can come and go, this will not be the right fit for you. We are looking for consistency and our clients are looking for consistency. So please, only apply with us if you can give us regular and consistent availabilities for shifts, and you’re really keen on building solid relationships with us and with our clients.

If you’re an intensive care specialist or an ED specialist, we also want to hear from you. We’re currently expanding our medical team as well. We can also help you eliminate your bed blocks in your ICU and in your ED for your long-term patients, or for your regularly readmitting patients with our critical care nursing team at home. We’re here to help you take the pressure off your ICU and ED beds. In most cases, you won’t even pay for it. Even if you do pay for it, it is so much more cost-effective than what you’re paying for in ICU and ED, and you get the same level of care.

If you’re a hospital executive watching this and you have bed blocks in your ICU, ED, and respiratory wards, or for home TPN, please reach out to us as well. We can help you eliminate your bed blocks very fast.

If you’re in the U.S. and in the U.K. and you’re watching this, and you need help, we want to hear from you as well. We can help you there privately with one-on-one consulting and with hiring nurses privately.

Once again, our website is intensivecareathome.com. Call us on one of the numbers on the top of our website, or simply send us an email to [email protected].

If you like my videos, subscribe to my YouTube channel for regular updates for families with Intensive Care at Home and intensive care. Click the like button, click the notification bell, share this video with your friends and families, and comment below what you want to see next or what questions and insights you have from this video.

Thank you so much for watching.

This is Patrik Hutzel from intensivecareathome.com and I will talk to you in a few days.

Take care for now.