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(From Aberdeen Press & Journal (UK))
Elderly residents of a rural Angus community could soon be using videophones to contact carers in what has been dubbed a virtual sheltered housing scheme.
Angus Council social work director Robert Peat has mooted the new telecare scheme as a way of helping older people to feel safer and less isolated at home.
A charity for older people, however, has raised concerns that telecare technology could be used to replace human contact and leave pensioners feeling cut off.
The Angus scheme, which looks set to be piloted in the Sidlaws area, would involve videophones being installed in the homes of about 30 elderly people, allowing them to see their families, other local pensioners with videophones and council care staff on a screen as they chat to them.
It is hoped the technology will help older people to live independently in their own homes if they do not want to move into sheltered housing. The council has applied for Scottish Executive funding for the scheme and other telecare projects which could benefit up to 1,000 elderly, disabled or vulnerable people in Angus.
A joint report by Mr Peat and neighbourhood services chief Ron Ashton, set to go before the social work committee tomorrow, states: "The proposal is to develop a 'virtual' sheltered housing model for older people, bringing some of the benefits of traditional sheltered housing through a peripatetic warden service.