ADDRESSING THE ETHICAL ISSUES ASSOCIATED WITH HEALTHCARE ICT RESEARCH IN OLDER ADULTS

1. ADDRESSING THE ETHICAL ISSUES ASSOCIATED WITH HEALTHCARE ICT RESEARCH IN OLDER ADULTS Alasdair Mort,1,2 Anne Roberts1,2 1dot.rural, RCUK Rural Digital Economy Research, University of Aberdeen, 2Centre for Rural Health, Inverness. a.mort@abdn.ac.uka.roberts@abdn.ac.uk 1) Difficulties obtaining NHS approval ABSTRACT We applied for NHS ethical approval to recruit rural older adult patients with chronic pain (male and female, aged 60-79 years) and their care providers who delivered home visits. It took three attempts to gain NHS Research Ethics Committee approval for our research. In the end we received approval for only one piece of work, not three as originally planned. This delayed our research by approximately six months. This FRRIICT-funded case study focuses upon the cross-disciplinary dot.rural TOPS project (Technology for Older adults: Maximising Personal and Social interaction). dot.rural is the University of Aberdeen’s Digital Economy Hub. The case study explored issues encountered when 1) applying for NHS ethics approval and 2) when accessing rural older adult NHS patients with chronic pain and their care providers. BACKGROUND Future health policy expects that ICT will play a greater role in healthcare provision, enabling patients to remain at home for longer. However, there is concern that any abrupt or insensitive implementation could be counterproductive. The Committee felt that asking patients about their pain constituted a form of assessment, which could undermine the assessment of the trained care provider. The Committee also felt that the length of interviews should be considered with care. However, we were also made aware that the Committee we applied to was known anecdotally to be more strict than others. Home healthcare technologies could disrupt much valued personal and social interaction with health and social care providers. This of particular concern to rural older adults with chronic pain, who may already be physically and socially isolated. 2) Problems identifying participants RESEARCH We initially attempted to identify patients and their care providers through GPs. However, involving the community nursing team proved much more fruitful, although some nurses were concerned about their activities being observed by a researcher. Recruitment of patients continues to prove challenging as the target group are unique and hard to reach. Also, pilot work noted that some older adults had no concept of “technology”, and most had not heard of “Skype” or “telehealth” for example. TOPS aims to develop technology that will harness digital interaction between older adults and their care providers. This is envisaged to include functions of tried and tested technologies such as Skype and/or Facebook. The first phase of TOPS aimed tounderstand older people's experiencse of chronic pain and the value they attach to home visits from health / social care providers.It was during preparation for this phase that we encountered two key issues: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to sincerely thank FRRIICT for their generous support of our case study.