Automated Reminders Boost Medication Adherence
By Katie Wike, contributing writer
Patients who received automated reminders when it was time to refill their medications were much more likely to adhere to their doctors’ instructions.
Researchers from Kaiser Permanente were able to mine electronic health record (EHR) data to improve medication adherence in a recent study. Published in the American Journal of Managed Care, the study evaluated more than 21,000 members who take drugs for diabetes and heart disease drugs. These included statins, ACE inhibitors or angiotensin receptor blockers.
Data from the EHR told researchers which patients were in need of refills for these medications and allowed them to use different types of reminders to make sure they picked up their prescriptions. According to EHR Intelligence, patients were divided into three groups: those receiving usual care, those who were given automated telephone calls reminding them to refill their medications, and those who were provided with enhanced reminders, including letters and live calls. This resulted in a 2 percent increase in medication adherence for these prescriptions.
"This small jump might not mean a lot to an individual patient, but on a population level it could translate into fewer heart attacks, fewer deaths, and fewer hospitalizations, which will ultimately have an important impact on public health," said Bill Vollmer, PhD, lead author and senior investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research, in Portland.
Patients in the intervention group - those who received letters and phone call reminders - also saw an improvement in their cholesterol levels. Patients who started the program with “uncontrolled” cholesterol levels of greater than 100 mg/dl were able to reduce their levels by an average of 3.6 mg/dl more than patients who only received usual care.
“We were trying to see if we could improve adherence to medications that have a proven efficacy for secondary disease prevention for people who have diabetes and existing cardiovascular disease,” Vollmer told the Portland Business Journal. “Most people take the medications, but they don’t take them every day as they should. They take them roughly every other day. We are trying to do what we can to improve that.”