Free telecare in Newcastle

It is sad that anyone needs to knock the efforts of a council trying to promote a preventive approach to tackling the support needs of older people.

Whilst this form of telecare (a care phone and a few sensors) may not necessarily represent the best value for money for the council in terms of outcomes and targets, the time-limited nature of the initiative offers an ideal way of understanding the costs involved, and of seeing the benefits to the health, social care and housing economies - providing that a robust and independent evaluation is performed using a matched group without telecare for comparison.

I would like to see other councils follow Newcastle's initiative with similar free offers but using alternative telecare technologies (using my definition of telecare!) - perhaps computer assisted proactive calling, video doorbells, plug-in automatic lights, collection of some physiological data, and mediated telephone discussion groups. Then we might see what type of telecare is most cost-effective.

In terms of cost comparisons, I wonder if any council has considered providing a vulnerable group with a "broadband" (ADSL) connection and 6 months of service for free? This would open the door to a number of 2nd and 3rd generation telecare applications where an "always on" connection is required and where the new set-top boxes will be able to offer a wide range of information, remote rehab, videophone and other services free of charge. This might help to avoid the emergence of a cohort of digitally excluded people who become socially isolated and tomorrow's big users of both NHS and council resources.