The Ethics of Telehealth and Telecare – Unit M3 Dr Paul Rice David Barrett

Learning outcomes By the end of the session, you will be able to; – Relate ethical principles to the implementation of telehealth – Discuss practical solutions to addressing ethical issues in telehealth deployments C1/1

At the broadest level, ethics is the study of people’s moral behaviour (e.g. Good/evil; right/wrong) That may sound rather abstract, but the aspiration to act ‘ethically’ should underpin everything we do To start, we’ll discuss some broad ethical principles and healthcare issues, before looking in more detail at telehealth and telecare M3/1 What do we mean by ethics?

Ethical principles Beneficence Non- maleficence JusticeAutonomy M3/2 Beauchamp T L, Childress J F (2008) Principles of Biomedical Ethics, 6 th ed. Oxford, Oxford University Press

For the ethical principle that your group has been allocated, think about a possible circumstance where telehealth – Supports that principle – Challenges that principle Where there are ethical challenges, how can users and carers be safeguarded against them? M3/3 Ethical principles and telehealth

‘Real world’ ethical concerns M3/4 ‘Big Brother’ Reduced human contact Dependence on technology

Ethical benefits M3/5 Clinical benefit Enhanced self-care and independence Fairer distribution of resource

Supporting ethical practice in telehealth M3/6 Holistic assessment Informed consent Privacy and dignity Robust governance

M3/7 Guidance on ethics in telehealth