Necessary Skills and Knowledge for Staff Providing Telehealth Services

More telehealth services are being established as frameworks for health provision in the EU are being transformed. The transformations involve not only changes in approach to service provision, but also require service staff to have appropriate knowledge and some understanding of the technologies concerned. That knowledge and understanding must include the ways in which telehealth technologies can (a) be harnessed by users - in order to give them greater control over their conditions and/or lifestyles; and (b) be deployed to support people who are dependent or vulnerable. This paper, drawing on the UK and wider European experience, sets out six skills and knowledge sets that can now appropriately apply to health and social care staff that are involved in telehealth service provision.