Grace of Mary Hostel

About Grace of Mary

Open in 1998, our caring and nursing services are provided by experienced staff whose focus is on residents’ well-being. Our team of Lifestyle staff, helps residents to find and participate in, meaningful daily activities which are stimulating and engaging – providing hours of enjoyment and reminiscence. Residents also benefit from the facilitation of exercising their choices and preferences, with dignity, thus enhancing their independence, self-worth, and, in effect, their quality of life.

Life at Grace of Mary is a home away from home.

At Grace of Mary, we recognise the importance of fostering relationships and nurturing residents’ individuality by providing them with opportunities to interact in a positive and respectful way with those around them. We are committed to ensuring our residents’ social, cultural and religious needs are also met, within a Greek and Greek-Cypriot environment.

Our home’s philosophy reflects our residents’ values; and we work to ensure that they are understood, their rights are upheld, their voices are heard, and their culture and way of life are continued.

Nurses and Care

A key to our person-centred care approach, is the regular and detailed communication that takes place between all who are involved in a resident’s care, including the residents themselves. This is integral in ensuring a holistic approach which works to support and benefit, residents’ overall physical and emotional well-being. Our skilled team of Nurses and Care staff are committed to ensuring our residents are provided with competent and consistent care, which focuses on everyone’s unique clinical, emotional, and social, needs. Aside from having GP’s on site regularly, our overall wellbeing services also include:

  • Specialised clinicians
  • Physiotherapy
  • Nutrition specialists
  • Podiatry
  • Dental
  • Hearing
  • Psychology
  • Geriatrician
  • Outreach programs
  • Palliative care
  • Behaviour support
  • Speech pathology
  • Dementia Australia...

...just to name a few

Lifestyle

Our Lifestyle program, with its holistic approach, aims to enhance our residents’ quality of life and stimulate the mind and body through a variety of meaningful activities, which are culturally sensitive and promote communication and social interaction. In addition to our engaging daily Lifestyle programs which include cooking, games, education, etc., our home also offers regular Church services (either within our home, or at our local Greek Orthodox Church), Pastoral care, Excursions, Shopping trips, and visits to Greek Elderly Citizens clubs. Our home also celebrates residents’ Name-days, Birthdays, and many other culturally and religiously significant days, throughout the year. Our BBQ’s and celebrations are well-known for their abundance in, traditional Greek food, music, dance and endless ‘glendi’ – and our residents always look forward to these special events with enthusiasm.

Facilities

Our home’s facilities are designed to encourage daily interactions amongst residents, staff, volunteers, and family; and help foster an enhanced sense of enjoyment and independence. Our large welcoming courtyards which are surrounded by olive, lemon, and orange trees, are the perfect place for family gatherings and celebrations. Our communal dining and lounge areas are spacious, yet warm and inviting; and with Greek channels available in the communal area, a cosy library filled with a variety of Greek and English books, magazines and Greek Orthodox religious paraphernalia, and 2 fully functional communal kitchenettes - our residents feel as if they are at home. Our home also comprises of a secure specialised ‘sensitive care’ area. Residents’ rooms are spacious, single rooms, each with their own private ensuites.

Meals

Meals at Grace of Mary are prepared on site by Greek cooks who ensure tradition is maintained. Our home prides itself on the variety and culturally specific foods created, which include meals like Moussaka, Lahanodolmades, Beftekia, Soutzoukia, Horta, Hirino, Faki, Pastizzio, Kritharaki, and much much more. Additionally, and more deliciously, we can’t forget to mention some of the delectable desserts, such as Galaktoboureko, Kataifi, Tourtes and Loukoumades, just to name a few.

Providing and maintaining culturally specific care, food, entertainment, and emotional support – helps to ensure that residents from Greek backgrounds, have the opportunity to continue live their lives, the way they always have; the positive implications are many; one of which is the help to reduce feelings of apprehension with the sometimes daunting, transitional phase, of coming into an aged care home. By cementing residents’ cultural traditions and belief systems within our home, we create an atmosphere of a warm and welcoming Greek family residence, thus benefiting all involved in this next chapter of an individual’s life.

After a lifetime together with his beloved Ermioni (over 68 years), my father now lives at Grace of Mary. To be ‘separated by illness’ was not ever part of their imagining, yet my parents have embraced this massive change in life with grace and gratitude. Grace of Mary is very homey; it feels, sounds, and smells, like home. It’s all things Greek. What is truly unique and rare, is the genuine respect and courtesy with which my father is afforded.
Effie Mineo – daughter of resident