Medication nonadherence accounts for about half of treatment failures, 125,000 deaths, and a quarter of hospitalizations annually in the US. Of the nearly 4 billion scripts written in the US each year, it’s estimated that one-fifth of new scripts are never filled. ThedaCare, our fellow Wisconsinites, are taking a few hands-on approaches to improve medication adherence in their community: 1. Creating a retail pharmacy (pictured below!) that offers medications at costs that are similar to or lower than those at outside pharmacies. 2. Delivering outpatient medications directly to patients’ rooms before they’re discharged to ensure they’re filled. 3. Offering both curbside pick-up and mail delivery for medications. Now, 60-90% of ThedaCare’s hospitalized patients fill their prescriptions before discharge. Plus, programs implemented at the retail pharmacy have contributed to millions of dollars in savings that allow ThedaCare to give more back to their community, including by funding the Caring Hearts program that provides one-dollar medications. Great work, folks! Read more: https://lnkd.in/g3aqkK6P #healthcare #healthIT #pharmacy
Epic - Yes, that is a problem, not only with medication but other treatment modalities. I predict that in the future doctors will get to know patients better personally and thus can help craft a medication/treatment plan that is based on the patient's lot in life, their personality, etc. - something that will actually have a better chance of implementation, rather than making a prescription and monitor non-adherence or people just getting sicker. If interested, I propose how this could be done in Chapter 8 of my book "Future Healthcare Today: How Technology is Revolutionizing Holistic Wellness” - https://books2read.com/u/3nBMDo.
This sounds like a great program!
Jonathan Lee
2mo
Considering the importance of this issue, I would call on Epic to invest dramatically more resources into the development of Willow Ambulatory to better support this pharmacy and those in FQHCs.
Don O'Brien
2mo
One aspect of non adherence is the cost of the prescription and/or copay. Even with insurance, millions need to balance housing and food with the out of pocket for meds that are hundreds, even thousands each month.
Eric Alvarez
1mo
At Grapefruit Health, we utilize pharmacy students to reach out to patients either post-discharge, or at other strategic times, to determine what their barriers are to their medications. Our students then address the barrier so the patient can get back on track!
Jennifer Onstott
2mo
This is great to see as this has been a challenging issue for patients as discharges are progressively getting later in the evening. We have experienced where retail pharmacy’s don’t have the scripts filled timely as the patient is on their way home or have limited hours post covid.
This great news. Now patients don’t have to leave and go to their pharmacy to fill prescription they will have them when they leave. This is life changing!!!
Erica Neher
2mo
Way to go ThedaCare!
VP, Enterprise Solutions at DrFirst | Healthcare problem solver | Epic Alum | girldad
2moThanks for calling out this critical issue. Nonadherence is a huge problem and leads to billions in extra health care costs. Match these efforts up with population health tracking of adherence over time for maximum impact. Getting those refills (on schedule) is just as important as that first fill.