Telecare assists and supports people living at home, allowing them to remain independent in the community. Telecare is the use of sensors which works alongside a community alarm and can provide a means of automatically signalling the required response to an emergency or crisis situation as it arises. 

Telecare is not a new system as it has been available in the form of a community alarm service for a number of years.  While the community alarm relies on the user pressing the pendant to alert the call centre to an emergency, the telecare sensors provide an automatic alert to the call centre.

Who Can Benefit from Telecare?

All service users can benefit from telecare dependent upon the individual’s circumstances and assessed need.  This can include Older People, Adults with Mental Health or Learning Disabilities, Adults with Physical Disabilities, People with Dementia, People with Epilepsy and Children with Disabilities.

What is the Purpose of Telecare?

The Community Alarm and Telecare Sensors, alongside package of support i.e. home care, day care, meal deliveries etc would contribute to the reduction in people requiring to go into long term care or being admitted/readmitted to hospital.  It can also help to reduce the pressure on informal carers/family/friends and increase the speed of discharges from hospital once clinical needs have been met.

Listed below are some examples of the different telecare sensors available and the benefits that each sensor can provide.  Please note that these are examples and there may be other sensors available (not listed) that meet individual needs.

Examples of some Telecare Sensors:

This sensor is placed in a wrist-strap device (like a watch) and can detect a fall which will automatically raise an alert. 

A radio smoke sensor, which works similar to a normal smoke detector, provides additional protection by raising an instant alarm call to the response centre who can then contact the Fire Brigade.

Monitors for low and high extreme temperatures. 

This package can be used short term and includes a variety of sensors to provide a greater assessment of a person’s care needs.  Reports can be received from the call centre regarding the client’s daily living routines.

This sensor warns of natural gas leaks i.e the gas cooker ring is left on without being lit, or the gas fire is on without being lit.  It does not isolate the gas but can send an alert to the response centre. This sensor is not used in relation to gas boilers for central heating.

This sensor can provide early warning that the person has left their bed and not returned with a pre determined time or has not went to bed (at night) or got out of bed (in the morning) by a certain time.  The times set on the sensor are discussed with the client and their family to replicate normal lifestyle routines and the times can be adjusted as required.

This sensor can provide early warning that the client has left their chair if they are at risk of falling.

The epileptic seizure alarm is a sensor that monitors a person, who suffers from epilepsy, while they are asleep.  The sensor is able to detect normal movements from epileptic seizure symptoms – such as tonic-clonic shaking or similar continued movement.