Case Studiess

Our Journey to Digital Telecare – Perth and Kinross Council

Key drivers for transitioning to digital telecare:

• Analogue to digital switchover planned for 2025;
• Alarm Receiving Centre replacement in 2016 to the Jontek Answer Link System was also capable of being “digitally ready”;
• Being digitally ready for the switchover.

High level steps to enable key drivers:

• Secured funding from Scottish Government to commence a Pilot Project;
• Obtained internal approval to commence Pilot Project;
• Arranged upgrades and enhancements to current Jontek ARC system – the majority of which was to Disaster Recovery Facility;
• Purchased 10 digital units and related peripherals each from 3 identified suppliers for the Pilot Project for initial testing to determine best performance.

Partners:

• A mix of internal and external stakeholders:
• Internal: IT, Community Alarm, Information Security and Technology Enabled Card Steering Group;
• External: Digital Office for Scottish Government, The City of Edinburgh Council, East Lothian Council, Farrpoint, Jontek, Doro and Possum.

Key challenges and overcoming them:

• Basic Community Alarm package included a smoke and heat detector which were also required for testing with delays in obtaining these digitally ready peripherals;
• Geography, as Perth has a lot of rural areas and testing units still requires a lot of consideration in these areas;
• Communication has been a challenge however building a robust project management structure around the project internally has addressed this and ensured that stakeholders are informed of progress;
• Concerns over security and privacy impact was and continues to be a major challenge.

Next steps in digital telecare journey:

• Close to commencing testing;
• Virtual Private Networks have been set up but there are some teething issues with traffic flowing between the servers;
• In house testing of units before moving out into the Perth and Kinross area.

Published date: April 2020.