Telecare Soapbox: Britain’s Got Pendants

May 31, 2009 | by | 22 Comments

With this headline everyone – in the UK at least – will know what I was watching last week but it set me thinking: where did the English telecare initiative that started in 2004 go wrong? Why has it failed to deliver the stunning performance that seemed so certain after such a strong second round and getting through to the final?

Was the Telecare Policy Collaborative just a flash in the pan?

Did Building Telecare in England hit some wrong notes?

Was the Preventative Technology Grant a flawed act?

Has the PASA National Telecare Framework Agreement lost its glitter?

In short, why is it that

most of Britain is still suffering the same jaded routine (pendant alarm systems) as 10 years ago, albeit re-branded as ‘telecare’, when the Policy Collaborative was trying to boil up something fresh, daring, diverse and dynamic?

Can telecare, as originally envisaged, be rescued from the sidelined losers?

Put yourself in a judge’s seat and have your say in a comment.

Telecare Soapbox: Northern Ireland’s ‘unhappy first birthday’ approaches

May 14, 2009 | by | 3 Comments

We are now approaching a year since Northern Ireland’s Centre for Connected Health published its Prior Information Notice (PDF) for a large-scale, province-wide remote patient monitoring service.

It’s not a happy first birthday because, as far as anyone can tell, the procurement process is not likely to come to a satisfactory conclusion any time soon.

For us on the outside it is hard to tell whether this is due to the complicated nature of the task, or incompetence, or a mixture of both.

However, as a matter of opinion, it didn’t help that the tender invitation did not include information that the selection criteria would exclude ‘small’ suppliers with relevant experience, some of whom committed resources to prepare a bid for a process in which they later discovered they would not be allowed to participate… (more…)

GE/Intel QuietCare video

April 6, 2009 | by | 5 Comments

2 mins 36 seconds. Title: GE/Intel: A commitment to the future of home healthcare

Excellent, non hyped-up, explanation of how telecare should, and can, work. In this case in an assisted living setting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1N0RRUTMXs

The human star of the video is ex-school teacher Honor Hacker who has featured in a number of pro-technology articles, and spoke last year at a briefing of the US Senate’s Special Committee on Aging. It’s good to see she is still going strong. Here are a few of her stories from previous years:

Technology helps seniors live independently. Minnesota Public Radio, December 2005

Silent Guardians. Star Tribune, Minneapolis-St Paul, February 2007

Capitol Hill Briefing Features Technologies That Could Transform the Lives of Seniors. American Association of Homes and Services for the Aging, January 2008

Six Steps to Telecare Press Release Happiness

April 4, 2009 | by

Part 1: Three basic mistakes and how to avoid them

First mistake: It’s not about you

Time after time I see companies and organisations falling into the trap of thinking that the press release is about them.

This is only true if it is a stock market-orientated press release reporting your company’s performance. Even then you may be missing an opportunity or two. Yes, it is your press release, but the cold reality is that unless you are in the Intel/Sony/Microsoft league no one cares about what your company is up to…

Read more…

Part 2: The language of robots! Avoid alienating your readers

When it is humans who read press releases why does it seem that so many are written to be read by robots? (And I’m not talking web bots, here!)

In the first part of this series I touched on your potential audiences, although before writing you would do well to sit down with colleagues and roughly flesh out the answers to…

Read more…

Part 3: Specific advice for frontline telecare/telehealth services

The first two parts of this series have dealt with identifying the audiences for your press release and how to avoid turning them off.

In this part I offer some specific advice to telecare/telehealth organisations and companies that deal directly with the public, such as alarm monitoring companies, councils and housing associations in the UK, and charities.

Read more…

Part 4: Specific advice for supplier companies

Company news (new chief officers, acquisitions, takeovers, investment plans, etc.) is only marginally more of a story for supplier companies than service provider ones, as they will have some industry-specific audiences, such as shareholders.

However, by writing dull ‘this is the facts’ press releases on these occasions you may, as I mentioned at the start of Part 1, be missing an opportunity or two.

Read more…

Part 5: Press release structure and press release doom

The conventional press release structure helps readers extract the information they want quickly.

There are variations, depending on the industry and type of press release and, when submitting releases to online distribution services, the elements often have to be split up and put in different boxes. That is, the structure is determined for you. However, the typical structure looks like this:

Read more…

Part 6: How to get journalists to contact you – and being prepared when they do

I’m glad I’m not a journalist working on a national newspaper.

Imagine…day after day having tens, possibly hundreds, of stories pitched to you in the hope that you are going to spend your precious time helping the authors get publicity.

Well, here are a few tips for breaking through that and increasing your chances of getting your story picked up and enticing a journalist to contact you for more:

Read more…

Telecare Soapbox: When is a healthcare company a healthcare company?

March 9, 2009 | by | 1 Comment

Steve Hards asks “What questions should telehealth commissioners be asking suppliers?”

Now that the laughter in the UK’s telecare/telehealth community over Tunstall’s name change in the UK to ‘Tunstall Healthcare’ has subsided into a rather nervous giggle, it’s an appropriate time to raise the question of what criteria does a company have to meet to be recognised as a healthcare company? (more…)