Mainstream adoption: assistive technology transfer's final hurdle

摘要

Objective The technology transfer process is often assumed to end when technology is placed on the market. However, for assistive technologies, the final hurdle is the adoption of the technology into mainstream practice. For assistive technologies such as telehealth, where adoption into mainstream practice requires a major investment by health services, the process of moving from a marketable technology innovation towards mainstream adoption introduces numerous potential barriers. Main Content In this paper, we consider these barriers for telehealth, which we define as the delivery of health care at a distance using information and communication technologies (ICT). We consider two 'gaps' which need to be filled to proceed to mainstream technology adoption - the 'evidence gap' and the 'adoption gap'. Results Twelve components in achieving successful adoption, originally defined by Brownsell, are discussed in the context of these 'gaps', and on-going major efforts in the Yorkshire and Humber region of the UK, to assemble these components into a coherent effort to encourage adoption of telehealth, are described. Conclusion Although the evidence base for telehealth is growing more robust, in order to fill the evidence gap, more research is needed on the clinical- and cost-effectiveness of different ways of implementing telehealth in a wider range of health conditions. Filling the adoption gap requires major resource and co-ordination between a number of organizations. Three principal remaining barriers have been identified and these will be addressed in a forthcoming large-scale project. Placing assistive technology on the market is the tip of the iceberg and more consideration needs to be given to problems of adoption lurking beneath the surface.