Implementing Transnational Telemedicine Solutions

please visit our project website for more information www.transnational-telemedicine.eu

Project Timescale: 01/09/2011 to 31/12/2013

CRH Project Team:

David Heaney, Project Lead
Lee Dowie, Project Manager
Gerry King, Project Research Nurse
Leila Eadie  - Research Fellow
Gillian Galloway - Project Development Worker
Emma Coats - Communications Officer
Emily Duncan - Project Secretary

The Centre for Rural Health in Inverness, Scotland will lead a Northern Periphery Programme (NPP) strategic project entitled 'Implementing Transnational Telemedicine Solutions' (ITTS). The project includes partners from 6 northern European countries; Scotland, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. It is worth a total of €2.3M and will commence in September 2011 running until December 2013. The project will implement transnational telemedicine solutions, at scale, and in a sustainable manner, into everyday practice across the Northern Periphery.

Ten demonstrator projects on the themes of video-consultation, mobile self-management and home-based health services will be implemented in clinical specialities including speech therapy, renal services, psychiatry, emergency services, diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, rehabilitation and care of the elderly. Common evaluation methods including health economics will quantify the outputs. It will also fund three new posts at the Centre for Rural Health.

This project will carry on from the work carried out in the NPP funded Competitive Health Services project where existing best practices and innovations were piloted.

David Heaney, the Project Lead and Associate Director at the Centre for Rural Health said "The challenges of implementing solutions that are sustainable, transnational and at scale are considerable, but strategic investment at this time has the potential to transform health delivery in the northern periphery of Europe"

Lee Dowie, the Project Manager, Centre for Rural Health said "We are delighted to have this opportunity to develop telemedicine services for patients living in the remote and rural northern periphery of Europe. We are looking forward to working with our partners across Europe, and learning from them"

The Northern Periphery Programme is one of thirteen Interreg IIIB programmes aimed at encouraging and supporting transnational co-operation between the regions of Europe. It provides the opportunity for organisations from the programme area to work together on joint projects concerning common issues and problems. http://www.northernperiphery.net/

The Centre for Rural Health is an academic research centre which is a collaborative venture between the University of Aberdeen and the University of the Highlands & Islands. Its mission is to 'advance knowledge of health and health services in rural and remote communities' http://www.abdn.ac.uk/crh