Department of Information Technology, School of Computer Science and Information Systems, Pace University, New York, New York, USA.
Department of Public Administration, Pace University, New York, New York, USA.
Inform Health Soc Care. 2022 Oct 2;47(4):361-372. doi: 10.1080/17538157.2021.2006198. Epub 2021 Nov 25.
As older adult populations rise in the United States, community-based telehealth programs are gaining momentum because of their ability to provide telehealth services for community-dwelling older adults at a lower cost compared to home-based telehealth services. The success of such community-based telehealth programs heavily depends on end-user engagement and acceptance; however, few studies to date have explored these issues. We conducted an interview study with 14 active and 3 inactive participants of a community-based Telehealth Intervention Program for Seniors (TIPS) to examine older individuals' perceived benefits and barriers to participating in community-based telehealth programs as well as strategies to improve those programs. We found that older adults had a positive experience toward the use of telehealth services in a community setting, including benefits like monitoring health status and enabling socialization. There were no perceived barriers about the telehealth program. Aspects that can be improved include facilitating the management and sharing of historical physiological data, providing additional assessments of cognitive and/or mental status, supporting self-education, and enabling more comprehensive health status tracking. We conclude this paper by discussing the implications of our results to the improvement of community-based telehealth programs for low-income, vulnerable aging populations.
随着美国老年人口的增加，基于社区的远程医疗计划正在兴起，因为与家庭为基础的远程医疗服务相比，它们能够以更低的成本为社区居住的老年人提供远程医疗服务。此类基于社区的远程医疗计划的成功在很大程度上取决于最终用户的参与和接受程度；然而，迄今为止，很少有研究探讨这些问题。我们对 14 名积极参与和 3 名不活跃的老年人社区远程医疗干预计划（TIPS）参与者进行了访谈研究，以探讨老年人参与社区远程医疗计划的感知益处和障碍，以及改善这些计划的策略。我们发现，老年人对在社区环境中使用远程医疗服务有积极的体验，包括监测健康状况和促进社交等好处。老年人对远程医疗计划没有感知到障碍。可以改进的方面包括促进历史生理数据的管理和共享、提供认知和/或心理健康状况的额外评估、支持自我教育以及实现更全面的健康状况跟踪。最后，我们讨论了我们的研究结果对改善针对低收入、弱势老年人口的社区远程医疗计划的意义。
