The Department of Health has said that over the next five years it will work with industry, the NHS, social care and professional organisations so that people with long term illness can benefit from assistive technologies such as telehealth and telecare.

This further commitment to telehealth and telecare follows the visit by Paul Burstow, the care minister, to Cornwall to see the technologies in use.

Burstow said: “The trials of telehealth and telecare have shown how people with long term conditions can live more independently, reducing the time they have to spend in hospital and improving their quality of life.

“The feedback I have heard from people in Cornwall has been incredibly positive. They were absolutely clear that high-tech healthcare being used here has improved their lives for the better.”

The minister said he wanted to see more people across the country benefiting from this sort of technology.

“That is why we are working with industry, the NHS and councils to change the lives of three million people across England over the next five years,” he said.

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