Flint’s Diplomat Pharmacy Inc. announced in April it is expanding its relationship with New York’s AdhereTech to include more manufacturers’ products, making smart pill bottle technology available to more patients.
AdhereTech’s smart pill bottles use sensors to record medication use in real time. Patients can receive medication reminders after missing a dose, and the device can trigger a call from the patient’s care team for additional support.
Diplomat and AdhereTech collaborated on a rollout of the program. Patients could elect to use the bottles, and the companies analyzed their results, comparing them to adherence metrics before using the smart-bottle program.
Over a year, the average patient using the bottles experienced more than one additional medication fill, a 12-percent higher patient retention rate, and 19 fewer gap days, or time without medication between fills.
Following the successful program launch, Diplomat and AdhereTech are expanding the program to products from additional pharmaceutical manufacturers, giving thousands more patients access to the technology.
“We’re proud to partner with AdhereTech to provide our patients with one more tool to manage chronic and complex conditions,” says Gary Rice, executive vice president at Diplomat. “Diplomat’s philosophy is ‘Take good care of patients, and the rest falls into place.’ Accordingly, this program improves patients’ treatment experience and enhances patient care.”
