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Die Verbesserung der Compliance ist für alle Medizinalpersonen und insbesondere für die Patienten eine alltägliche Herausforderung. Es gilt, die Notwendigkeit einer Therapie einzusehen, mit der Therapiewahl sich anfreunden zu können und dann einen Therapieplan in den Alltag integrieren zu können – allenfalls mit einer lebenslangen Dauer. Willentliche und unwillentliche Non Compliance sind häufig; Studien berichten von bis zu 50 %. Die Apotheker, als letztes Glied in der Versorgungskette, sind in bester Position um den Patienten nach Motivation, Kenntnissen und Hindernissen zu befragen und maßgeschneiderte technische und motivationale Hilfe zu leisten. Unverzichtbar ist die eingehende Anwendungsinstruktion bei der Abgabe, damit allfällige eingeschränkte Fertigkeiten (Geschicklichkeit, Sehvermögen, Kognition) erkannt und Hilfe angeboten werden kann. Eine Vielzahl von Hilfsmitteln sowie neue Technologien können gezielt eingesetzt werden um auch die langfristige Befolgung eines Therapieplanes zu gewährleisten.

Universities of Oxford and Cambridge study of "Feasibility and acceptability of electronic blister packaging to measure medication adherence in patients with type 2 diabetes in a long-term medication group"

Measurement of adherence by electronic blister packs was obtained from 94.3% of enrolled patients, and therefore Med-ic technology was found tobe feasible, and acceptable to patients. The study further concluded that "Electronic blister packs offer an alternative approach to MEMS containers for objective measurement of medication taking in a group of patients with a long-term condition."

Every once in a while, a new "RFID Smart Blister" arrives on the scene, and the OtCM package from The Compliers Group in Netherlands is one such latest design. A new research study conducted by University Hospital Mainz in Germany found that, when testing another recently launched smart blister technology, only 82 out of 94 packages survived patient use and from those, just 80% to 95.7% of events accurately, or at all. Furthermore, these packages were tested by just removing 10 doses from the blister, presumably making the situation much worse had packages with 21, or 30 doses been tested in similar fashion.

Med-ic's 7-year experience with self-adhesive smart labels for medication blisters, and real-life, multi-year, multi-center clinical studies which demand an extremely high level of accuracy and reliability, has resulted in many designs yielding real-life package survival over 90 days in patients hands of better than 95%, and dose reporting accuracy of 99.6% or better, even with 14, 21, 30 and up to 42 doses per package. Med-ic smart labels are easy to apply, and are produced with non toxic conductive inks printed directly on paper labels.

Med-ic Blisters are designed to be better than 99.6% accurate in reporting dosing events, even when packages are handled in adverse, moist, or cold conditions. Validation data and references are available to qualified parties by contacting jwatters@med-ic.biz

Adherence to therapies is a primary determinant of treatment success. Poor adherence attenuates optimum clinical benefits and therefore reduces the overall effectiveness of health systems.

“Medicines will not work if you do not take them” — Medicines will not be effective if patients do not follow prescribed treatment, yet in developed countries only 50% of patients who suffer from chronic diseases adhere to treatment recommendations. In developing countries, when taken together with poor access to health care, lack of appropriate diagnosis and limited access to medicines, poor adherence is threatening to render futile any effort to tackle chronic conditions, such as diabetes, depression and HIV/AIDS.

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It is estimated that 30% of perishable food crops are lost in transit, costing billions of dollars in profits and putting additional pressure on already high food costs. With biofuels diverting crops formerly grown for food, such unnecessary losses are now driving the problem into the realm of national security.

According to a recent informal poll of Healthcare Packaging (HCP) readers, half the respondents agreed that packaging should enter the stream at the beginning of the clinical trial. An encouraging number, considering the metamorphosis the primary package will likely undergo as the drug formulation continues to change during the course of the trial.

While some companies may be actively seeking the value proposition of RFID implementation, others have discovered that the value proposition already exists in applications utilizing active RFID.

The purpose of this website is to present the status of development of a wide variety of portable electronic medication monitors that could be used to supervise the self-administered treatment of tuberculosis and perhaps AIDS. The discussion includes both commercially available devices and various designs of potential medication monitors, to allow investigators and funding sources to chose the optimal device for their needs and encourage inventors to develop improvements.

Guidelines for Temperature Control of Drug Products during Storage and Transportation