Welcome to our newly introduced Solutions 4 Health (S4H) technology blog which aims to inspire new ideas and provide a platform for debate in the healthcare sectors we participate in. This is new for us and so we will be trying different formats and methodologies in trying to keep the Blog interesting for our readers.
A tiny little bit on Solutions 4 Health (S4H) – we are recognised for introducing technology and innovation to services, partnership working and tackling the bane of health inequalities. Our main thrust is providing health prevention services for the UK population including among others stop smoking services, weight management, healthy eating and self-management of chronic diseases.
At the end of this busy week I put my mind to thinking about some of the hot items on my ‘to do’ list and working out what my plan should look like for the coming few weeks. However as we’ve just won a couple of sole provider contracts these plans may well be scuppered by ‘needs must’. This is the excitement that publicly funded contracts bring to the work environment.
On another note I frequently scan the healthcare technology news and at this time it all seems to be about ‘wearables’. Everybody has been waiting for the Apple ‘health’ Watch, although the recent announcements mean this is probably not the case anymore. The most recent announcement is that of ADT (you know the building alarm specialist) introducing a wearable ‘On-The-Go Emergency Response System’ watch for their customers – ADT says that one out of three adults over the age of 65 in North America fall each year. In the event of a fall, the device will detect the fall and connect the customer directly with ADT’s 24/7 professional monitoring centre.
And funnily enough we’re also involved in wearable technology by running our own ‘assisted living’ pilot using a new wireless system. We’ll be evaluating the system over the next 3 months with an elderly lady or ‘service user’. This system has a wearable device and yes it is a watch which connects with the home hub when the service user is at home. When outside away from the hub the watch acts as a pedometer tracking the number of steps they take.
Actually from my point of view, as a sibling with three other brothers and sisters with an elderly ‘Mum’ living in an apartment quite a few miles away, this would be an ideal ‘peace of mind’ system for us. The service user’s portal is accessed through a web browser and provides simple indications of whether Mum’s opened the refrigerator door to get the milk out for her morning cup of tea OR has the front door been opened this morning because care workers normally ensure Mum has her medication? Each of the siblings can be included in the circle of friends/carers so that everybody gets alerted when there’s no activity on particular sensors or ‘Mum’ presses the emergency button on the watch.
We’re looking forward to kicking off a falls prevention service in the next month and there’s an obvious connection between this and ‘assisted living’ solutions that we’re piloting. Help in the home to keep people out of A&E and allowing carers, family & friends to passively or actively connect with the older or multi-morbidity service user is certainly the way forward. This will mean better outcomes for those seeking independent living with safety very much in mind.
That’s all for this week…ciao till next.
John Guyatt / Director – Technology and Systems
