Telemedecine – Centre for Rural Health

Posted on January 30, 2012 by Cathy Stephenson

News of a Scottish lead in a European funded project:

The Centre for Rural Health will lead a Northern Periphery Programme (NPP) strategic project entitled  ”Implementing Transnational Telemedicine Solutions” (ITTS).  The project includes partners from 6 northern European countries; Scotland, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. It is worth a total of €2.3M and will be running until December 2013. The project will implement transnational telemedicine solutions, at scale, and in a sustainable manner, into everyday practice across the Northern Periphery.  The Centre for Rural Health Newsletter provides more information here (page 2).

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Taking the lead?

Posted on May 16, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

On the main site there was a recent report that The Royal Family were not adopting Telecare for their elders; however, according to this report in The Courier technology is on the Royal agenda in the shape of iPad.  A researcher at the University of Dundee is encouraging older people to engage with technology, based on his research over the past 10 years.

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Telecare Supports Carers

Posted on May 7, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

iriss Insights 08 is a document underlining the benefits of telecare to unpaid carers  and can be found at this link iriss_insight8_telecare.

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Confirmed Investment in Health Technology

Posted on May 7, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

At last years Holyrood organised conference on Telecare and Telehealth one of the keynotes addressed the concerns that patients may have about privacy of their data.  This week the Scottish government has awarded a £1.1m contract for privacy breach protection software to Northgate Managed Services, for use by all health boards in the country.

The news has been reported in several locations but here is The Guardian article.

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Protesting Council Community Alarm Price Rises

Posted on May 5, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

Unhappy Angus residents are angered by the Council’s Community Alarm price increase reported here in The Courier.   The report does not clarify whether the anger is truly about the cost or whether it is about lack of community engagement from the Council before imposing the increase; however this is the second report on the matter, with Third Sector organisations adding their support to statements made by a citizen earlier this week.

We do not get a particularly objective view from the report about the value and benefits, or otherwise, of the services in question, although Angus Council does add a statement to allay the fears of those who may find the cost increase difficult.  With recent reported protests about perceived cuts to services for disabled people in West Scotland and with the likelihood of more cuts and savings on the way we are likely to see more of this sort of report … they do say that “there is no such thing as bad publicity” What do you all think?

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Shifting the Balance of Care in the Isles

Posted on May 5, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

After a very quiet few weeks during the electioneering and as we wait for all the news that will spill out of today’s vote here is a report from the Shetland times about confirmed funding under “Shifting the Balance of Care” to build on existing services, supporting people at home and including use of telecare in the Isles.

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Tortoise speed Telecare?

Posted on April 26, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

No the tortoise analogy is not to progress in the Scottish telecare sector but to the almost non existent relevant news … I figure you can all see the electioneering and it really isn’t news is it?  But I did catch sight of the first report I have seen confirming telecare inclusion in successful change fund bids – please if you know your partnership change fund has been confirmed and reported let me have the link so we can share.  In the meantime this is from Renfrewshire.

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Scot’s advice to English Telehealth

Posted on April 13, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

Dr James Ferguson (lead clinician at the Scottish Centre for Telehealth) shares his view as to the slower adoption of telehealth south of the border in this Guardian article.  Although the focus of the article is on telemedicine I did find myself in sympathy with much of what James offers and this in particular “We should actually be using this technology a whole lot more cleverly to support people before they get ill, and when they do get ill, select the patients that actually need the resource and reassure the ones that don’t that they’re okay. It’s not a difficult concept, but it’s a really difficult one to get people to change their behaviour.”

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Social media engagement to improve assistive technologies

Posted on April 7, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

Now here is an interesting take on how to engage with the people who can benefit most from well designed assistive technologies and get them involved in the design itself.  Blackwood Foundation has won lottery funding to use purpose developed  Social Media to connect innovators and disabled people in a novel way.

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Heartwarming take on “Care home”

Posted on April 7, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

With no apologies for the lack of Telecare, I wanted to share this article -a good example of “community”, “care”, “befriending” … enjoy.  Well done Drummond Community High School for establishing these valuable connections.

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Upcoming Conferences and Events

Posted on April 6, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

Looking  a little further ahead to some events around Scotland in May 2011, some of the following have early registration discounts and some are free but have a registration deadline.  I am always amazed how many events are going on that we don’t hear about until too late, so if anyone knows of any other events please let me know and I will update the list.

 

 

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Scottish National Care Service

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

Tiptoeing past the politicians, regardless of the outcome of the Scottish Elections the independent report by a team lead by Sir John Arbuthnott sets out a call for a National Care Service – if implemented it would certainly change the landscape of how we deliver telecare and telehealth in the future for Scotland’s Older people.  Read the National Care Service Expert Panel Report

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New Product – Personalisation

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

We will hear a great deal over the coming year about Self-Directed Support (Scotland), personalisation, person centred planning and co-production.  These were key themes at last week’s Long term Conditions Alliance Scotland conference.  At one of the workshops, hosted by Janette Hughes of Wellness and Health Innovations, Neil Campbell introduced an electronic Person Centred Planning (ePCP)webservice due to be launched this Spring.

The website is not yet available but Neil has summarised the product in a short PDF An Introduction to ePCP

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RESEARCH – Melatonin in Alzheimer’s Disease Project

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

A Press Association item on Yahoo News 28.3.11 announced further research by Glasgow based CPS Research into the effect if Melatonin on Alzheimer’s disease patients.

Telecare can contribute to individuals remaining more independently in their community for longer, however, we should not exclude other contributory factors such as, for example, maintaining good sleep patterns. This is the link to the CPS Research website explaining who they want to consider including in the 6 month study and this is the online Press Association report.

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Telecare for Sensory Impairment

Posted on March 26, 2011 by Cathy Stephenson

A recent report about fire detection Telecare in East Renfrewshire highlights the importance of assessing the need for Telecare to be adapted to incorporate alerts for those with sensory impairment.  The Evening Times carried this article.

UPDATED: and a further article appeared in Barrhead News

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