Dr Ruth Chambers, our clinical lead for our technology enabled care services programme gave evidence to the House of Lords COVID-19 committee virtually on Tuesday this week.
Ruth relayed examples and details of our wide ranging digital inclusion projects and digital upskilling of clinicians, social workers and social prescriber leads – all went down really well. The focus was on how digital exclusion may have exacerbated health inequalities especially in relation to people’s physical health across our population during the COVID pandemic. And then what the NHS and social care could and should do at scale with government support to adopt varied approaches to enhance people’s physical health via digital delivery of care and avoid unintended consequences such as excluding groups of patients- such as older people, those with mental health problems, those with poor availability or accessibility to a phone or engaging online.
The video below captures the two hour session with evidence from another clinician, academic and HealthWatch lead representing patients and the public.