Every participant with complex needs should have a written crisis response protocol, and most do not. When something goes wrong at 2am — a seizure that will not stop, a carer taken to hospital, a support worker who cannot rouse someone, an escalation that has become unsafe — nobody should be working out who to call. This page explains what belongs in a crisis protocol, gives you a template you can fill in for any participant, and lists the Western Australian numbers that actually answer.
Complex Care Continuum’s line is answered 24 hours a day on (08) 9515 8000. If you support one of our participants and something has gone wrong, call us. If it is life-threatening, call 000 first and us second.
Emergency numbers for Western Australia
Checked August 2026 against each service’s own website. Print this and put it on the fridge, in the support worker folder and in the vehicle.
| Situation | Who to call | Number |
|---|---|---|
| Life-threatening emergency, or immediate danger to anyone | Police, Fire, Ambulance | 000 |
| Mental health crisis, Perth metropolitan | Mental Health Emergency Response Line | 1300 555 788 |
| Mental health crisis, Peel region | Mental Health Emergency Response Line (Peel) | 1800 676 822 |
| Mental health crisis, regional WA (4:30pm–8:30am weeknights, 24h weekends) | RuralLink | 1800 552 002 |
| Health advice when it is not an emergency | healthdirect | 1800 022 222 |
| Poisoning or suspected overdose | Poisons Information Centre | 13 11 26 |
| Someone in emotional distress | Lifeline | 13 11 14 |
| Concern about a provider, worker, or the quality of supports | NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission | 1800 035 544 |
| NDIS plan or funding question, including urgent plan changes | NDIA | 1800 800 110 |
| Support and information for family carers | Carer Gateway | 1800 422 737 |
What a crisis protocol has to contain
A protocol is not a policy document. It is one or two pages that a support worker who has never met the participant before can pick up and act on. If it takes longer than thirty seconds to find the right instruction, it has failed. These are the sections that matter.
1. Who this is about, in one line
Name, date of birth, address, NDIS number, and the single most important thing a stranger needs to know first — for example that the participant does not use speech, or that they have a seizure plan, or that they will not tolerate being touched without warning.
2. What counts as a crisis for this person
Crisis is individual. For one participant it is a seizure lasting more than five minutes; for another it is a blocked PEG tube; for another it is the moment a behaviour of concern moves from shouting to throwing. Write the specific triggers down, in the participant’s own pattern, not in general terms. Include the early warning signs that come before it, because the point of a protocol is to act during the warning rather than during the crisis.
3. What to do, in order
Numbered steps, plain language, most urgent first. What to try, what not to try, when to give emergency medication if there is a plan for it, when to stop and call an ambulance. Any clinical instruction must come from the treating health professional and be written by them, not invented by a provider or a family member.
4. Who to call, in order, with numbers
First contact, second contact, then the provider’s after-hours line, then the relevant crisis service from the table above. Include the GP, the treating specialist, the behaviour support practitioner and the support coordinator, with direct numbers, not switchboards.
5. Consent, decision-making and restrictive practices
Who can make decisions for this person, and about what. Whether there is a guardian or a plan nominee. Whether an advance health directive exists and where it is kept. If any restrictive practice is authorised, say so explicitly, name the authorisation and attach the behaviour support plan; a worker must never improvise one.
6. What happens afterwards
Who is told, and how fast. What gets written down and where. Whether the incident is reportable to the NDIS Commission, and who lodges it. When the protocol itself gets reviewed, because a crisis almost always reveals something the protocol got wrong.
The template
Copy the headings below into a document and fill them in with the participant, their family and their treating team. Keep it to two pages. Review it every six months, after every incident, and after every hospital admission.
Participant
Name · Date of birth · Address · NDIS number · Communication: how they communicate and how to know they are distressed · The one thing a new worker must know first
Known crisis situations for this person
For each one: what it looks like · early warning signs · what usually causes or precedes it · what has worked before · what makes it worse
Response steps
Step 1 (immediate safety) · Step 2 (de-escalate or clinical action, as written by the treating professional) · Step 3 (when to escalate) · Step 4 (when to call 000) · Anything a worker must NOT do
Contacts, in order
1. Primary contact — name, relationship, phone, any times they are unreachable
2. Secondary contact
3. Provider after-hours line — Complex Care Continuum, (08) 9515 8000, answered 24/7
4. GP — name, practice, phone
5. Treating specialist
6. Behaviour support practitioner
7. Support coordinator
8. Relevant crisis service from the table above
Medical
Diagnoses relevant in an emergency · Current medications and where they are kept · Allergies and adverse reactions · Emergency medication and the written plan authorising it · Equipment (PEG, ventilator, oxygen, catheter) and the supplier’s after-hours number · Preferred hospital · Advance health directive: yes/no and where it is kept
Decision-making
Guardian or nominee: name, authority, phone · Restrictive practices authorised: yes/no, which, under what authorisation · Behaviour support plan: attached, dated
After the event
Who is notified and within what time · Where the incident is recorded · Whether it is a reportable incident and who lodges it · Debrief for the workers involved · Date the protocol was reviewed
How we handle crises
For participants we support, the protocol is written during onboarding with the participant, their family and their treating team, and every worker on the team is trained on it before their first solo shift. It sits in the home and in the worker app. Our line is answered 24 hours a day by someone who can reach the clinical lead, and after any incident we debrief the workers, notify the coordinator and family, lodge whatever the NDIS Commission requires, and review the protocol rather than filing it away.
Get help writing one
If you are a support coordinator or a family carer and there is no protocol in place, we will help you build one, whether or not the participant is ours. Call (08) 9515 8000 or email info@complexcarecontinuum.com.au.
This page is general information for planning purposes. It is not clinical advice and does not replace a plan written by the participant’s treating health professionals. In an emergency, call 000.