We’re the evaluation partner for Shropshire Council’s DHSC funded research into virtual care technology in domiciliary care
My Home Life England is delighted to share that we are the evaluation partner for Shropshire Council’s virtual care delivery project, funded by the Department of Health and Social Care.
The 2 year project aims to help meet people’s care and support needs digitally, by embedding technology in people’s homes, alongside a virtual care delivery service. It aims to promote quality of life and support independence.
Our evaluation seeks to find out:
- How virtual care delivery enhances and challenges traditional models of care delivery
- What impact it has on quality of life – for people supported in their own homes by community-based adult social care providers, their families, those providing the care and the wider health and care system.
We want to understand the lived experience of both those using the technology and the care providers delivering support.
We are excited to be involved in this innovative project; evaluating the role that the technology has in supporting and enhancing care delivery, with a view to improving care experiences and making care systems more sustainable.
The project and our evaluation is now underway!
About our involvement
Earlier this year we held a ‘Theory of Change’ workshop, to guide the design of the research interviews, our data collection and anticipated outcomes. The workshop brought together stakeholders from the council (commissioners, social workers, virtual care team members), from the NHS, care providers and the tech company.
The first set of qualitative interviews have also taken place. We are initially undertaking interviews with four groups of individuals – current users of the technology, family members/informal carers, care providers and members of the council team.
These will be followed up with quarterly interviews (until February 2025) , as well as a questionnaire sent to all the users of the technology, to provide a spectrum of views from a wider population.
All this will support us in creating case studies and observations as to how the tech is being used by individuals, their care teams and families/informal carers.
In phase two of the project (late 2024 to summer 2025) we will also be evaluating a device to support people with more complex needs.
This project was awarded funding from DHSC’s Adult Social Care Technology Fund – the Government’s 3 million pound investment to transform technology in adult social care.
Find out more about the 4 projects that received funding