Medication adherence issues account for a significant portion of avoidable health care costs each year, through drug waste, treatment failure, and medical complications. Identifying ways to improve adherence ripples out positively throughout the health care system – benefiting the patient, payers, and all other key players.
The pharmacy model at BioPlus Specialty Pharmacy focuses on connecting, understanding, and “staying with” each patient. This goes far beyond our initial visit with patients, when we learn about their current medical issues, past health concerns, concurrent medication usage, and other pertinent information. At BioPlus, we check in with patients and interact about adherence issues each and every month while patients are under our care. This results in our impressive medication adherence rate of 97% (based on the past 12 months, adherence at discharge).
Patients aren’t the only factor in adherence. Ongoing communication with the physician’s office provides another way to support high adherence. This is where our Tap App web tool comes in – providing an easy and instant way for physician offices to access real-time specialty pharmacy information and treatment monitoring about their patients under our care. Physicians are even alerted when their patients experience a dip in adherence, allowing both BioPlus and the physician a chance to provide some “course correction.”
The specialty pharmacy model that we’ve developed at BioPlus has solid research to back it up. Over the years, several studies have confirmed that ongoing monitoring and collaboration among the health care team improves adherence in patients. The latest in this line of research, based on data from the Veterans Health Administration, found that pharmacist education of patients and pharmacist monitoring of patient medication use were both successful as adherence-boosting strategies.
As the researchers of this study conclude: “…longer duration of monitoring and providing more intensive care to nonadherent patients in collaboration with the clinician improved adherence.” This is exactly what BioPlus provides, which pays off with our excellent patient adherence rates.
Stephen C. Vogt, Pharm.D.
President and CEO
BioPlus Specialty Pharmacy
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Sources
Shore S, Ho PM, Lambert-Kerzner A, et al. Site-level variation in and practices associated with dabigatran adherence. JAMA 2015;313(14):1443-50.
Smith A. Wide variability in medication adherence among patients with atrial fibrillation. HCPLive May 26, 2015.
