Around 100,000 people will be able to access telehealth services during 2013, health secretary Jeremy Hunt has announced in a speech to Age UK. The move is a part of an overall ambition to extend telehealth to three million people by 2017.
The project will be led in England by seven ‘pathfinders' - NHS and local authority organisations including clinical commissioning groups - which will agree contracts with industry suppliers:
- Worcestershire (3 CCGs and Worcestershire County Council)
- North Yorkshire & York and Humber PCT Cluster (will involved the CCGs as they develop)
- Kernow CCG and Cornwall & Isles of Scilly PCT
- NHS Kent & Medway (8 Kent CCGs, Kent Community Health Trust and Medway Unitary Authority)
- NHS Merseyside
- NHS South Yorkshire & Bassetlaw (Sheffield, Barnsley Rotherham Doncaster and Bassetlaw PCTs but will include CCGs as they develop)
- Camden CCG(with UCL Partners).
Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt said: "Technology can help people manage their condition at home, free up a lot of time and save the NHS money."
Technology also forms a key part of the NHS Mandate, which outlines the expectation of shared electronic health and care records by March, 2015.
He said: "In a world where technology increasingly helps us manage our social and professional lives, it seems logical that it should also help people manage their health."
Age UK has welcomed the pledge as a way to help people stay in their homes for longer.
Michelle Mitchell, charity director general at Age UK, said: "'Whilst Telehealth is not a replacement for face-to-face appointments and direct care, it could give many people a real chance of taking control of their health and improving wellbeing."
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Ailsa Colquhoun
Quelle/Source: Dispensing Doctors' Association, 14.12.2012
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