The Department of Health has announced that it will be beginning piloting primary care commissioning of telecare in July, with pilot sites chosen by next month.
Speaking at the recent Managing Long Term Conditions conference in Telford, Gary Belfield, the DH’s head of primary care announced that three PCTs will be chosen next month to deliver hardware, worth an estimated £5,000, to patients in their homes.
Belfield told the conference that it was necessary to find a way of dealing with the increasing burden of chronic diseases, which is set to increase rapidly by 2020 and self care by these patients could easily be used by 70 -80% of the long term conditions population.
Moving closer to self-care could save the NHS money, with the cost of a hospital admission being up to £1000 plus.
Three pilot sites will be chosen in May from a shortlist of PCTs and work will begin at the demonstrators in July. If successful, the scheme will be rolled out nationwide over the following two years.
The telecare machines were likely to include equipment such as blood pressure gauges to cover four conditions: diabetes, chronic heart disease, the frail elderly, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. They would be monitored remotely by community nurses who will follow up any alarm recordings.
As part of PCT commissioning, boards will be required to first need to assess needs, review service provision and decide on their priorities. Once strategic planning is completed, they will begin to design their services and shape the structure of the supply they are given.
GPs will then be able to manage demand and make referrals based on an assessment criteria, offering the patient advice on their choices, treatments or activities they can participate in. Telecare participants should be asked for their views and opinions and quality performance and outcomes should be monitored.
Belfield said that it was vital that the DH worked with Connecting for Health to ensure that the systems will support a shared health and social care record. He outlined a skills set to ensure that communication between the health and social care bodies were strong and all partied involved were aware of the patient’s programmes. Partnerships were fundamental he said.
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DH White Paper: Whole System Long Term Conditions Demonstrators