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. 2025 Apr 17;25(1):256.
doi: 10.1186/s12877-025-05890-0.

Identifying the challenges of a telecare system establishment for older adults and providing a solution: a qualitative study

Forough Saraee  1 , Alireza Atashi  2 , Alireza Namazi Shabestari  3 , Akbar Rasouli  4 , Mohammad Arab  5
Affiliations

Identifying the challenges of a telecare system establishment for older adults and providing a solution: a qualitative study

Forough Saraee et al. BMC Geriatr. .

Abstract

Background: New approaches to health care delivery, including telecare, provide an opportunity to address the challenges in an aging population. Thus, this study aims to identify the challenges of the telecare system establishment for older adults in Iran and provide a solution.

Methods: The present research is qualitative and inductive study. Accordingly, 19 semi-structured interviews are conducted with experts in the fields of geriatrics, information technology management, informatics, and health services management. The data are analyzed by Braun & Clarke's thematic approach using MAXQDA.

Results: According to the study results, the challenges of a telecare system establishment for older adults in Iran are classified into three categories: socio-cultural, structural-organizational, and legal. Within the socio-cultural domain, educational and behavior-communicational challenges are particularly noteworthy. The structural-organizational domain encompasses challenges related to workforce, policy, technical and infrastructure, standardization, and financial challenges. The legal domain also includes legal and security challenges.

Conclusions: The present study results indicated that a telecare system establishment for older adults faces numerous obstacles. EHealth initiatives in Iran are in their early stages, but it seems that the prerequisite for establishing telemedicine and telecare is the creation of electronic health records.

Keywords: E-Health; Healthcare innovation; Older adults; Telecare; Telemedicine.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: All interviewees had provided an informed consent for participating in the study before the interview. Indeed, informed consent was obtained from all the participants. All stages of the current study were ethically reviewed and approved by the ethics board of Tehran University of Medical Sciences. The ethical code is IR.TUMS.SPH.REC.1400.119. The study was conducted in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki (2013). Consent for publication: No applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests. Clinical trial number: Not applicable.

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