Eighteen months ago, a Melbourne woman named Leila had a stroke and went to a local hospital. After medical support over a few weeks, Leila was ready to be discharged from the hospital, but required some specialist support due to her disability.

Three weeks ago Leila finally left hospital care. After nearly 18 months in limbo, left lying in a hospital bed, Leila can finally get on with her life.

Unfortunately Leila’s story is not unique. More than 1,430 people with disability are waiting 160 days to be discharged from hospitals around Australia. To those of us who work in this sector it is not surprising.

Once segregated

For decades we housed people with disability in segregated accommodation and institutions. Shut away where they couldn’t be seen or heard, abuse was rife and positive life outcomes for residents were rare. At best it was a case of “out of sight, out of mind”. At worst, it revealed something more sinister about the way we viewed disability.

Thankfully, as a society we have come a long way. The advent of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) brought disability into the spotlight. At the recent federal election, it attracted renewed political focus.

And yet, people with disability remain stuck in hospital for months or years after they are ready to be discharged. There is no practical reason for this and it doesn’t save costs. In fact, it is twice as expensive to accommodate NDIS participants in hospital compared to disability housing.