Telecare Stakeholder Action Plan
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has published a Telecare Stakeholder Action Plan that aims to improve communications and co-ordination between telecare services, the telecommunications sector and people who use telecare services.
DHSC is taking a pro-active approach to support the telecare sector and the people who use those services in relation to the telecommunications industry led switchover from analogue to digital telephone lines. The Action Plan was developed to address issues in a report that DHSC commissioned from technology consultancy FarrPoint to understand awareness of the digital switchover in the telecare sector in England and which is being issued in tandem.
Digital systems will create a basis for a next generation of telecare services that will provide a means for more personalised and early preventive interventions. The digital switchover, which will be completed by 2025, has potential implications for the 1.8 million people who reply on telecare services in the UK. Telecare is still mainly provided through analogue equipment and the Action Plan seeks to encourage the telecare and telecommunications sectors to work together to mitigate risks and encourage understanding of the switchover.
The Action Plan includes work by the Local Government Association’s Digital Switchover Working Group, the TEC Services Association, UKTelehealthcare, Tech UK, the Housing Learning and Improvement Network, the Office of the Telecommunications Adjudicator, the Department for Digital Culture Media and Sport, Ofcom and BT.
The Action Plan:
- aims to improve overall communication and co-ordination between telecommunication providers, telecare providers and suppliers, and with people who use telecare services;
- seeks to resolve technical issues such as supporting more testing of existing analogue equipment to determine what devices will work reliably on digital lines in the short term after switchover, and keep users safe;
- considers how local authority telecare services may be transformed going forward.
While the Action Plan is for England, the switchover is UK wide and so there is close working with the devolved administrations.