Achieving sustainability in care systems

The potential of technology.

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About the work package

Led by Dr Kate Hamblin (University of Sheffield).

Wider, more systematic use of technology in care at home and advanced technology solutions in development offer promising solutions to the growing care gap, yet the place of technology as a source of future sustainability is far from clear.

The team working on Achieving Sustainability in Care Systems – led by Dr Kate Hamblin with Dr James Wright and Professor Janet Fast – is exploring the potential role of technologies in developing sustainable care systems, using a future-oriented perspective (to 2030) and taking a broad view of advances in technology. It concentrates on areas of particular promise for sustainability and wellbeing in care at home.

Stakeholder input features strongly in this team’s work as it addresses issues of practical, attitudinal and ethical acceptability, design and other requirements for embedding future technologies in care systems. The team aims to identify technologies with strong potential to support care at home, and to identifying a small number of really promising technologies which offer the best chances of contributing to sustainability and wellbeing in care systems.

This team’s main research questions are:

Which challenges to care system sustainability can be addressed using technology?
Which needs of older people living at home pose the greatest challenge for care system sustainability?
What can be learned from other countries about how and why technologies have been used to enhance the operation of care systems?
In the UK, which technologies have the potential to address challenges to the sustainability of care systems, especially those designed to support ageing in place, regarding
- care planning/organisation
- care delivery
- collection, communication and use of data in adult social care (eg, in predicting future risks / preventing avoidable deterioration, through timely and appropriate support).