WONTAMA aged care residents at Clancy Weston Lodge are now back in airconditioned comfort after the system broke down for two weeks.
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An Orange resident, who declined to be named for fear of identifying his mother at the facility, said he first became aware during a phone call to her and was concerned the outage occurred during the recent heatwave.
Between January 28 when the system went down and January 4, top temperatures in Orange fluctuated between 32 and 36 degrees before dropping to 26 degrees on January 5.
“The night I rang Mum, she was in her room and the window was shut and the door was shut and she was sweltering,” he said.
The heatwave was forecast, you would think a manager would check the airconditioning.
- Resident's son
The man said as of Wednesday, when the top temperature was 31 degrees, the airconditioning had still not been rectified.
“The heatwave was forecast, you would think a manager would check the airconditioning,” the man said.
“It’s a duty of care issue, they’re there to be looked after and they can’t do anything about it.”
He said his mother was given a fan, but he had to ask for a summer nightgown and for her windows and doors to be left open to encourage air flow.
He said she was not offered an ice block.
MAP: Where is the Clancy Weston Lodge …
Uniting Asset Manager Ross Noble confirmed an airconditioning fault affected 18 out of 76 rooms at the Wontama Residential Aged Care.
However, he said it had now been rectified, with all areas fully airconditioned.
“On identifying the fault, Uniting immediately notified the local airconditioning contractor to organise the repairs to rooms in the Clancy Weston Lodge,” he said.
“No common areas of the facility were affected.”
Mr Noble said Uniting was advised the contractor had initially ordered the wrong part and then identified an additional part was needed.
“These unforeseen delays were compounded by airconditioning supply companies [being] in holiday shutdown,” he said.
Mr Noble said Uniting offered all affected residents a portable airconditioning unit or a fan and purchased 20 fans during the outage.
“Blinds were pulled down in affected areas to reduce the heat,” he said.
“During this period care staff made extra efforts to regularly check on the comfort of residents and offer additional ice blocks and fluids.”
He said family members who rang or visited the facility were informed of the situation and lodge residents were issued a written notification on Friday to update them on the situation and apologise for any inconvenience.
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