It's well known that non-adherence to prescribed drugs is a major problem in healthcare (see: Medication Adherence: The Elephant in the Room). A quote from this article places the problem in the proper context:
According to the World Health Organization, medication adherence can have a more direct impact on patient outcomes than the specific treatment itself.1 Medication adherence can affect quality and length of life, health outcomes, and overall healthcare costs. Nonadherence can account for up to 50% of treatment failures, around 125,000 deaths, and up to 25% of hospitalizations each year in the United States.
Putting aside the question of the non-adherence because consumers can't afford their drugs, it seems to me that some of this problem is due to memory lapses, confusion, and carelessness on the part of patients. Given this, part of the solution may be periodic reminders from a smartphone app. Insurance giant Cigna is moving in this direction (see: INSURANCE GIANT CIGNA UNVEILS AI TOOL TO MONITOR MEDICATION ADHERENCE). Below is an excerpt from this article:
...[W]hile a new AI-driven [medication] monitoring system from US health plan Cigna aims to take big steps toward resolving that challenge, some experts fear that the new technology could also work against the interest of millions of patients. According to the Wall Street Journal, “(t)he product, called Health Connect 360 (see: Health Connect 360: Better Health Outcomes – Guaranteed), integrates data from a combination of sources and analytical tools and was originally developed for treatment of chronic diseases, including diabetes and heart disease, as well as for pain management. The system aggregates medical, pharmacy, lab and biometric data....into a dashboard that is accessible through an online interface.” Via that interface, doctors and nurses will be able to constantly keep an eye on patients' health and step in when they have cause for concern.
I think that such an app is a very good idea. For a relatively minor cost, a serious problem can be addressed. Part of the drift of the article cited above, is that the risk of such an app is the loss of privacy by allowing health professionals to "spy" on a patients. Moreover, it is also stated that the primary goal for this app is to create a dashboard that can be viewed by a patients' physicians and nurses rather than to suggest that it would have value for the consumer himself or herself. This is a reflection of the paternalistic view of healthcare, often paying scant attention to the wishes and interests of consumers who may be the prime users of such a dashboard.
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