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Health informatics for older people: a review of ICT facilitated integrated care for older people
Author(s) -
Loader Brian D.,
Hardey Mike,
Keeble Leigh
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
international journal of social welfare
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.664
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1468-2397
pISSN - 1369-6866
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-2397.2007.00489.x
Subject(s) - information and communications technology , government (linguistics) , social welfare , health care , public relations , health informatics , informatics , business , welfare , public health , older people , nursing , medicine , economic growth , gerontology , political science , economics , philosophy , linguistics , law
Growing demands on welfare services, arising from expanding populations of older people in many countries, has led policy makers to consider the use of information and communications technologies (ICTs) as a means to transform the cost‐effective delivery of health and social care. The evidence for these claims is examined by reporting the main findings of a review of worldwide published literature documenting the adoption of health informatics applications to improve health and social care for older people. It focuses around two dimensions of the UK government's programme for ‘modernising’ public services, which emphasise the use of ICTs to facilitate the sharing of health and social services information and its potential to foster person‐centred approaches to independent living. Findings suggest that there is little evidence that these dimensions have been realised in practice and the perceived incompatibility between them is more likely to produce expensive and ineffective health informatics outcomes.