Aged Care

Our range of sustainable insulation materials – in walls and ceilings, under floors and roofs, around building services and HVAC – help designers create more comfortable places for people to live and work.

How a building can impact the quality of life of aged care residents

The quality of indoor thermal and acoustic comfort directly impacts the health and welfare of older people living in care facilities.

• A UK study established that an older person’s thermal perception of the environment is ‘blunted’ due to the ‘biological consequences of ageing on thermogenesis and decline in thermosensitivity’. ²

• The study also found that people with dementia feel temperature more acutely, making them vulnerable to extremes of cold and heat. Their situation is made more difficult as they are often unable to communicate their needs to care home staff.

• Lack of mobility can also mean that many residents cannot adjust their thermal or acoustic environment.³

• Audiology Australia promotes good acoustic design for individuals with dementia. Their research reveals that people with dementia are particularly sensitive to their acoustic environment, and over- or under-exposure to noise can cause confusion, agitation, and aggression.⁴

At Fletcher Insulation, we’ll help you specify the best insulation materials for use in your residential aged care projects.

Our aim is to support better design of aged care facilities by:

• providing an optimum environment in which people can live
• creating a healthier indoor environment for all residents and staff
• reducing energy usage to control costs and environmental impact
• enabling higher Green-Star ratings and WELL certification
• safe, fire-resistant construction systems

A holistic approach to creating healthy living environments

Better building design improves the quality of life for older people in aged care.

Our integrated approach to building insulation encompasses acoustics, indoor thermal comfort, air quality, and fire safety solutions.

A supportive acoustic environment

The ability to hear declines as we age. Speech understanding is particularly affected, impacting our ability to communicate with others.⁵

Minimising external noise and indoor reverberations creates a better hearing environment for elderly residents in aged care.

For people with dementia or other chronic impairments, the auditory environment can positively or negatively affect their mood. By creating a positive acoustic environment that allows for better communication, aged care residents may feel less isolated and less anxious.⁶

Designing for comfort incorporates sound insulation in the building envelope and between rooms. Insulation helps to absorb unwanted sounds, improve speech intelligibility, and reduce disturbing operational noise.

Fletcher Insulation designs products that create a comfortable acoustic environment to support the health and wellbeing of residents in aged care facilities.

Controlling indoor thermal comfort, air quality and building condensation

Providing residents with safe, high-quality care is fundamental in aged care facilities.

As global temperatures rise due to climate change, older people are more vulnerable ⁵ to heat extremes.

• Their bodies are generally less efficient at dealing with temperature changes due to chronic illness and the effect of medications.

• This decrease in their ability to regulate thermal conditions is exacerbated by mobility issues and their inability to change their immediate environment easily.

• Spending most of their time indoors in an environment that’s not thermally comfortable or lacking in healthy indoor air quality, can lead to a decline in people’s physical and mental health.

Providing a comfortable and thermally efficient indoor environment for aged care residents supports their health and wellbeing. It also helps contain energy costs and avoids excessive emissions caused by inefficient heating or cooling systems.

Fletcher Insulation provides product solutions that optimise thermal comfort, condensation control, and indoor air quality in aged care facilities.

Protecting people and buildings from fire

Great building design is fire safe. It uses passive fire protection strategies to prevent a fire from starting and to slow its progress. They’re essential to protect property and people.

This is critical in aged care facilities, where people have limited mobility and physical and mental impairment.

Insulation in cladding, floors, ceilings, roofs, and around HVAC is integral to effective fire safety control.

Ensuring National Construction Code (NCC 2019 and 2022) compliance is non-negotiable. But building owners also need to consider standards and minimum requirements imposed by insurers. Choosing insulation that fails to fit these specifications could mean higher insurance premiums.

Specifying insulation that’s made of sustainable, non-combustible or low flammability materials is fundamentally smart design.

Fletcher Insulation’s range of non-combustible and low flammability insulation products are designed to keep people and buildings safe.

For the good of the planet

Fletcher Insulation’s commitment to sustainability and protecting the environment does not begin and end with supplying energy-efficient products.

It starts with our manufacturing processes.

We are working to reduce the carbon footprint of the built environment by:

• making insulation with zero Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP).
• ensuring our insulation products support healthy indoor air quality – our products contain no harmful levels of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).
• using recycled materials in our manufacturing process wherever possible. About 80% of the glass used in our glasswool insulation is recycled – by transforming a waste product, we avoid further landfill pollution.