The TCRM was developed to support communities – and stakeholders in those communities e.g., community representatives, legislative institutions, and payers – to create a favourable environment for implementing and scaling-up telemedicine. It is a valuable tool that helps to assess and improve the status quo for telemedicine in communities that can be connected locally (e.g., regions or health networks) or through a shared concern (e.g., a common disease). The TCRM has six phases, which range from pre-planning to professionalisation. They show how telemedicine initiatives can be scaled-up and evaluated, and communities can get involved.
The use of the model has already assisted several communities – for example in Australia, Croatia, and Scotland – to identify key aspects of their own telemedicine success stories.
Successes were identified in each of these three telemedicine initiatives in Australia, Croatia, and Scotland.
The Australian community benefitted from the fact that the stakeholders designed the layout and settings on mobile devices based on citizens’ needs: they engaged Aboriginal team members to ensure culturally appropriate communication with users.
In the Croatian community, co-development workshops were conducted with relevant stakeholders (including software developers, doctors, nurses, patients, and policy makers) to ensure people’s involvement.
The Scottish community also experienced the provision of adequate financial resources, made available by The Scottish Government Funding and Local Health Board resources.
Several key factors appear to have included stakeholder engagement and co-development; a focus on use cases, infrastructure, regional or governmental leadership, and financial support.
Further use of the TCRM could really help to encourage telemedicine implementation during ongoing waves of the COVID-19 pandemic.
This news summarises a paper by Dr. Lena Otto, (TU Dresden). To explore the subject more in-depth, download and read the attachment below.
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