A new Kaiser Permanente study documents that stroke patients are more likely to take their prescribed medication when it is delivered to their home, proving patients want convenience.
“The new data shows how patients with chronic conditions can increase savings, convenience, and adherence by having their prescriptions delivered directly to their homes,” Charles Coté, vice president, strategic communications for the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association, told American Pharmacy.
The data, presented at the American Stroke Association’s International Stroke Conference 2016, showed slightly less than half (47 percent ) of stroke patients stuck to their regimen when they picked up their medication at their local pharmacy, compared to 74 percent of patients who followed their regimen when they received their medication via mail-service pharmacies.
“The growth of Amazon.com and other online retailers that use home delivery shows that consumers want more convenience and savings,” Coté said. “For patients with chronic conditions like high blood pressure and rheumatoid arthritis, mail-service pharmacies save money and offer the convenience of getting prescriptions delivered to their homes.”
Patients using mail-service pharmacies typically receive 90-day prescriptions for medications they need on an ongoing basis. Local pharmacies initially are used to dispense medication at the beginning of a new regimen and to monitor acute-care prescriptions. However, once a patient has adjusted to a new medication and has completed several 30-day prescriptions from their local pharmacy, a patient may switch to mail-service pharmacy, Coté said.
Researchers also found that 56.4 percent of patients taking cholesterol-lowering prescriptions dispensed from their local pharmacy stuck to their regimen, compared to 88 percent of patients using mail-order. A similar pattern was observed in anticoagulant adherence — 56 percent of patients taking mail-delivered medications followed their regimen versus 45 percent for drugstore pick-up.
The Kaiser Permanente study was the first to analyze drug adherence among stroke patients and confirmed what many other studies have found — home-delivered medications cut costs for consumers and increases the probability that patients relying on medication for chronic conditions will take their medication consistently.
In 2013, a Department of Defense Office of Inspector General (OIG) report found that TRICARE's mail-service pharmacy program not only saves money, but also controls waste. The program also earned a 96 percent satisfaction rating among members and retirees of the country’s uniformed services and their families.
A 2011 study conducted by Kaiser Permanente and published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, revealed that patients receiving prescription medications via mail-service showed improvement in cholesterol control compared to patients who picked up their statin prescriptions from their local pharmacy.
An American Journal of Managed Care report written by researchers from the University of California at Los Angeles and Kaiser Permanente also observed a similar finding and concluded that patients receiving prescription medications for chronic ailments via mail-service pharmacies "were more likely to take them as prescribed by their doctors than did patients who obtained them from a local pharmacy."
Coté said the extensive research draws a single conclusion.
“Patients receiving their prescriptions through mail-service pharmacies follow their doctors’ prescribed drug regimens more often than drugstore users," Coté said. "This improves health outcomes and often reduces non-drug medical costs, such as hospitalizations.”
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