Smart health platform improves therapy adherence

Despite medical advances in recent decades, many treatments are still not as effective as they could be as many patients do not take their medicines as prescribed. Elderly patients may have difficulty in remembering to do so. Chronically ill patients may discontinue taking their medication once they feel better, unaware their disease may recur with severe knock-on effects. The incurred impact linked to poor therapy adherence in the US is estimated around $280bn and 125,000 casualties every year.

NXP is launching a solution that helps address this problem. An NFC-enabled sensor is embedded in blister packs or pill bottles and tracks which medication was removed at what time from the package. That information is recorded through the user simply tapping their smartphone to the package. This information can subsequently be used to offer therapy specific and personalised services to support patient, care-giver or healthcare professional.

“The World Health Organisation (WHO) reports that as many as 50% of patients experience difficulty following long-term treatment recommendations. These patients suffer as the ineffective treatment will deteriorate their health condition. Public or private payors suffer, as treatments will take longer and become more expensive” commented Bart De Loore, Vice President, Personal Health business, NXP. “Improving therapy adherence benefits the patient, public and private health budgets and pharma companies who can demonstrate improved patient outcomes. We believe the launch of our therapy adherence platform will help address one of the biggest challenges facing Health Care systems globally.”

The product value proposition has already been confirmed in the Honors Academy programme at the Radboud University in the Netherlands, who conducted a study around therapy adherence and how technology can be effectively used to address the problem.

NXP will collaborate with pharmaceutical and medical packaging companies, application developers, as well as public and private payors to deploy this solution. It will be demonstrated for the first time at AIPIA World Congress 2015 in Utrecht, Netherlands, 18th to 19th November.