Articles by Katie Mackintosh
Nicola Sturgeon MSP © by theSNP
Scotland is increasingly seen as a world leader in telehealth and telecare, Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon said today, but added that she would now like to see us go “further and faster”.
Opening the second day of Holyrood magazine’s two-day telehealthcare summit in Glasgow, Sturgeon spoke of the health benefits and economic potential of developing and deploying telehealth and telecare solutions in Scotland.
She told the audience that it is “no exaggeration” to describe telehealthcare as “one of the most exciting things in healthcare today, and also one of the most important.”
The demographic projections are “mind-blowing”, Sturgeon said. According to the most recent figures from the Registrar General for Scotland, the number of over 75s is expected to expand by 10,000 people every year through to 2021. If we don’t change the way we deliver care then by the 2030s we would require an additional 10 new hospitals to accommodate them, Sturgeon said.
“I should say when I pose that as a challenge that it is first and foremost a really good thing that we have more older people because it is a sign of success. We are all living longer and healthier lives so we should celebrate it.
“But we really also have to make sure it changes and challenges the way we think about things and the way that we do things, because if it doesn’t we are going to find the way we do things right now becomes pretty unsustainable in the not too distant future.”
One of the solutions is the shift in the balance of care to treat more people in com...
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