CSIP’s January Telecare Newsletter contains a significant article for commissioners of UK telecare/telehealth services and implementation managers and, I think, suppliers will also benefit from understanding the matters it raises. Mainstreaming telecare during 2008: some current issues lays out in 1.1 Commissioning – getting the balance right the clash between the desire to use systems to support people in a wide range of situations and the pressure to ration in favour of people with the most immediate needs. 1.2 Costing and charging is essential reading for people working within the system but will probably be a complete mystery to non-UK readers. However, it provides stunning insight into why it is so difficult to do business in this arena in the UK and why councils are so slow to implement change. If you had to work in such a complex and perverse system you would be slow too.
Newsletter (pdf version)
Newsletter index page (January’s not uploaded at time of publication.)