Telehealth

Telehealth, the remote care delivery between care providers and patients outside of a clinical facility, is receiving increased attention as a viable tool to support innovation in care coordination, accessibility and patient engagement. But Telehealth has still not made a significant breakthrough in any Member States yet despite a very large number of good pilot projects. 

Member States and the European Commission are working on a number of policy initiatives in response to the Telemedicine Communication of 2008. The recent Europe 2020 Communication, the Digital Agenda and the Innovation Union flagships further stress the importance of innovative services, such as those supported through Telehealth, to allow older people to live healthily and independently.

It is widely recognised that:

• care providers and patients must have a central role in the development of telehealth;
• industry is ramping up the offering of telehealth solutions;
• a notorious lack of awareness is prevalent across all sectors;
• diverse organisations representing  various interests have issued positions on Telehealth and/or are carrying out advocacy activities; 
• not only cross-stakeholder collaboration is essential to deliver Telehealth services that meet the expectations of the several groups concerned, but also that it contributes to balanced policy making.

HOPE is engaged in a Telehealth Campaign, a series of initiatives whose objectives are to increase the collaboration and awareness about Telehealth in support of integrated care in Europe amongst all the relevant stakeholders. Together with HOPE, the current promoters, representing patients, hospitals, health managers, health insurers and industry are AIM, EHMA, EPF, COCIR, CONTINUA Health Alliance, and EHTEL.

The Telehealth Campaign is calling for submissions of successful Telehealth stories to be part of a brochure titled “Real Telehealth Stories”. The brochure will be disseminated across a wide audience, namely the EU institutions, national and regional policymakers and officials, patients, healthcare professionals and managers, and industry.

If you would like to contribute to the development of Telehealth in Europe and let the world know about your work, then submit your success Telehealth story before 31 May 2011 to sg@hope.be.

More information

Activities

Hospitals in the 27
EU Member States

Quality of care

Human resources

Public health

Hospital, health care
and internal market

e-Health
The role of IT
Interoperability
Telehealth

Cross-border
co-operation

Green hospitals

Networking