Cambridge UK 30th January 2008: The next generation of elderly people will have a better working knowledge of IT and different expectations regarding healthcare than their predecessors. This, according to a report published this week by Cambridge, UK-based Wireless Healthcare, will increase the take up of telecare services and see Health 2.0-based services being used by the elderly.

In the report, “Health 2.0 And Telecare For The Elderly”, Wireless Healthcare sees the disappearance over the next decade of a number of inhibitors that are currently holding back the market for remote care. In one case study the report highlights the problems that elderly diabetes sufferers experience when attempting use home telecare devices. “Elderly people with limited experience of high technology struggle with the calibration and use of blood glucose monitors,” explains Wireless Healthcare’s Peter Kruger. “The next generation of users will be familiar with mobile phones, PDAs and a wide range of high technology devices.”

Wireless Healthcare also points out that an increase in the number of people familiar with online services will make it easier for telecare service providers to roll out monitoring services that will transmit data to a GP’s surgery and automatically add it to electronic patient records. While the report finds that incumbent healthcare providers are being slow to deploy electronic patient records and make them accessible to patients, it sees this providing an opportunity for Health 2.0 vendors who can use advanced and open healthcare services as a platform for a range of telecare services.

Kruger believes that the generation who drove social change in the 1960s will enter retirement with a new attitude to old age and healthcare. “Anyone designing an online system to help their parents ‘age in place’ should ask themselves ‘Is this how I see myself spending my old age?’”

However the report warns that increased life expectancy means that the current generation of elderly people will be with us for some time, and for the next decade telecare vendors must serve customers who have a wide variety of IT skills.

The report “Health 2.0 And Telecare For The Elderly.” is available from www.wirelesshealthcare.co.uk

About Wireless Healthcare

Wireless Healthcare are UK based analysts specialising in the application of mobile and wireless technology in the healthcare sector.

For further details contact:-

Toby Jackson
Wireless Healthcare
20 Leaden Hill, Orwell
Royston. Herts.
SG8 5QH