TV telecare: our audience votes yes to accessing services on TV

Telecare is an area many organisations are considering whether it be to realise savings, help people live independent lives for longer or relieve over burdened local health service providers. There are many amazing technologies that can help deliver home based care, however research shows that many older people do not have and will not have internet access, so this channel is not available to solution providers.

Looking Local is leading the UK's evaluation of eHealth and Telecare services on digital interactive TV. For nearly two years Looking Local has run separate telecare programmes; the EU funded T-Seniority project & a project in the Borders funded by the Government's Technology Strategy Board.

Initial evaluation of the T-Seniority results show that older people are incredibly keen on using TV as a channel to access health and related services and can now be seriously considered as a viable alternative to the web as a channel of choice and service efficiencies.

Headlines from the T-Seniority interview research

• 90% felt more informed with the service
• 81% felt the service made their life easier by giving them more autonomy over their life
• 38% used it daily, 30% used it on a weekly basis, 16% monthly and the rest less frequently
• 43% felt closer to their family via the email access
• 75% felt more confident towards new technology after the trial
• 80% felt T-Seniority enriched their means of communication
• 85% wanted to continue with the service after the trial
• 88% found the information and services clear and user friendly
• 97% could navigate the service without help
• 100% of participants used email and other areas of interest were highlighted as transport and health services, news & weather
• 88% found it sufficiently useful or very useful

The evaluation of the T-Seniority project was undertaken in two parts:

• Our researchers interviewed 90 people in Kent, Alston and Sefton who had been given access to the T-Seniority service for a number of months
• A questionnaire ran on the Looking Local service for several months and we received 370 responses

T-Seniority gave older people access to the following services:

• Transport Information
• Health Information
• Doctors Appointments
• Public Webcams
• News & Weather
• Picture Library
• Address Book
• Jukebox
• Email
• Events Calendar

The vast majority of the people in our group were of an age where they would be eligible for the Digital Switchover Helpscheme, and as switchover takes place they would be in receipt of assistance to ensure their home can receive a digital signal. This research provides UK health and public sector organisations with the proof that older people are keen to use TV as a communications channel, giving us a fantastic opportunity to deliver services on TV and realise financial and service efficiencies along the way.