Social networking-based personal home telehealth system: A pilot study

Background/Purpose: Although useful vital sign monitoring equipment and information communication technologies are readily available, many researchers and businesses are still attempting to expand coverage, yet expectations for the widespread adoption of home telehealth services have not been realized in Taiwan. The practical application of such systems are often found to be too complicated, too costly, and users, both older adults and professional caregivers, lack adequate motivation or experience to use the systems effectively. Methods: This paper describes a personal home telehealth system—Care Deliver Frame (CDF)—for older adults based on social networking, which transforms the home telehealth system into a platform for communication and care between older adults and their family members. The system is linked to existing social networking sites such as Facebook to encourage interpersonal communication between older adults and younger family members. The home telehealth system is implemented on personal mobile devices in the form of Apps. The scale and cost required for implementing the personal home telehealth system are greatly reduced. Results: From the pilot study of user evaluation, CDF was well accepted by the older participants and their children. Even though this evaluation is based upon a small sample size, it provides a good insight into participants' behaviors, preferences, and expectations, which helps to determine the future development of CDF. Conclusion: CDF presented in this paper extends the value of a home telehealth system from the provision of health care to enhancing older adults' interpersonal communication and social participation