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From Ghana to Australia:
a journey to help others
Having a loving and caring grandmother inspired
Bernice Anokye to devote her career to aged care.
By Patrick Avenell
B
ernice Anokye is the director of nursing at Shangri-La Aged
Care Home, a Hall & Prior facility in Hurstville, Sydney.
Originally from Ghana, Anokye travelled to Australia to study
nursing and gerontology.
“I was raised along with my two sisters in a middle-class
community in Ghana, the western part of Africa, by my
grandmother,” Anokye said. “My mother, who worked as a clothes
trader, and father, who worked as a country planner within the
government, moved from the country to the city, as there were
more career opportunities there.
“Living in Ghana was interesting, as we lived in a community-like
environment and the interaction with other families made life full
of fun, however, I later joined my parents and moved to the city for
boarding school.”
After completing high school, Anokye studied a Diploma in
Hotel Catering and Institutional Management and a one-year
certificate in education, leading to a job as a domestic bursar and
teacher in a local high school.
Aged 27, she emigrated to Australia in 2008, enrolling in a Bachelor
of Nursing, graduating in 2012. She is now undertaking a Master’s in
Gerontology at Western Sydney University, due to finish next year.
“My passion for the elderly was nurtured through my
grandmother when I was young back home in Ghana, where there
is no aged care system,” Anokye told Aged Care Insite.
“We all had to care for the elderly ourselves in the family home
for the remainder of their life, and from there my innate desire to
help people in times of need developed.
“I wanted to find a meaningful career where my skills and desire
to assist and care for the elderly would be valued and wanted to be
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able to give back the care given to me by my grandmother.”
Anokye continued to say that working in residential aged care
and witnessing the issues that are developing with the elderly and
frail have inspired her to work towards a deeper understanding
of gerontology and develop ways to serve residents in more
effective, kind and intelligent ways.
“I believe the mix of gerontology and residential aged care work
hand in hand to deliver innovation at the imperative care delivery
level that you find in the residential aged care environment,” she said.
“Whatever I can do to produce top quality aged care, I will do.”
The sheer scope of the Australian aged care industry – the
federal government expects to spend $21 billion annually by 2020
in this field – makes for a binary flip from Anokye’s homeland.
There is major dearth of government support in Ghana and, while
hesitant to be overly critical of the Australian aged care industry,
she mentioned how impressed she was at how positive the
changes to the industry are translating directly to residents’ health
and wellbeing, Anokye said that if there was something she would
like to see more of, “it is probably encouragement or incentive for
aged care industry staff to continually better themselves and their
skills through continuing education. This is a specialist field of
nursing and offers a great long-term and rewarding career.”
Outside of nursing, Anokye enjoys spending time with her
niblings, Davida, Amy-Rose and Nathan, and attending bible
study classes. ■