The eight high intensity supports
The NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission lists these as high intensity daily personal activities:
- Complex bowel care
- Enteral feeding and management, meaning nutrition through a feeding tube
- Severe dysphagia management
- Tracheostomy management
- Urinary catheter management, including indwelling, in and out and suprapubic catheters
- Ventilator management
- Subcutaneous injections
- Complex wound management
Who delivers them
These supports do not have to be delivered by a nurse. Trained support workers often provide them, working to a plan set and reviewed by an appropriately qualified health practitioner. What matters is that each worker has been trained for that person's needs and that specific support, against the Commission's high intensity skills descriptors.
Training for severe dysphagia management must be delivered by an appropriately qualified health practitioner. For the other supports, training can come from a qualified health practitioner or a person who meets the relevant skills descriptor.
What good high intensity support looks like
For each support, the Commission's module expects:
- You are involved in assessing your needs and writing your support plan
- With your consent, your health is reviewed regularly by a qualified health practitioner
- The plan says how risks, incidents and emergencies are managed and when to escalate
- The provider has policies, procedures and a training plan for workers
- Every worker supporting you is trained in your specific needs before they start
Registration for providers
To be registered for registration group 0104, high intensity daily personal activities, a provider is assessed against the relevant NDIS Practice Standards in the high intensity supplementary module. Registered providers can only deliver the high intensity supports listed on their certificate of registration, so check that a provider is registered for the specific support you need.
Pricing and funding
Support worker items in the NDIS Pricing Arrangements have a standard and a high intensity price level. For 2026/27, the high intensity price limit for weekday daytime self care is $79.60 an hour, compared with $73.58 at the standard level, in most of Australia. In its pricing schedule for the Disability Support for Older Australians program, which uses the NDIS price limits, the government describes high intensity as needing a worker with extra qualifications and experience for complex needs, such as frequent intensive behaviour support or continual active support for unstable seizures or respiratory support.
High intensity supports are on the list of subgroups protected from the October 2026 funding reset, so the 50% and 10% reductions do not apply to them. Supports in the home, such as personal care, are also protected.
Questions to ask a provider
- Are you registered for high intensity daily personal activities, and for my specific support?
- Who trains your workers, and how will they be trained for my needs?
- How often will a health practitioner review my plan?
- What happens if my regular worker is sick? Will the replacement be trained?
- How do you manage and report incidents and emergencies?