patient talks to doctor's office on the phone about prescriptions

Improve Your Patient Adherence Rates with Integrated Prescriptions

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Higher Adherence Rates from Integrated Software & Individualized Methods 

Given an alarming decline of patient adherence to treatment, it’s clear there’s a disconnect between the distribution of treatment plans and how patients receive them. Treatment non-adherence is damaging, harming both patients and the healthcare system.  

Factors such as cost, poor memory, or inadequate education about the treatment can limit patients’ ability to adhere to their plans. But you can directly address barriers—such as a lack of communication or collaborative effort in the treatment plan—with integrated prescriptions. 

Keep reading to better understand how you can increase patients’ chances of maintaining their treatments. You’ll learn more about what patient adherence really implies and how integrated prescription management addresses patient non-adherence. 

Improve Patient Adherence with the Right Software 

As a healthcare practice, an efficient practice management system that offers multiple solutions is crucial for your business’s well-being. Digitized forms, scheduling, patient communication, and administrative tasks allow your practice to be faster and more accommodating to patients.  

One way to improve your practice management is to implement software like intakeQ, which offers everything from forms to billing. With better practice management, patients will appreciate your efficiency and keep coming back. 

Yet, even if you have a catalog of returning patients, your practice is still moving backward if it doesn’t have integrated prescriptions. In addition to allowing integrations with your favorite supplement management software (such as Fullscript), intakeQ now also offers medical prescribing (eRX).  

Combining a prescription management tool with your practice management software helps you forge the patient-treatment gap by addressing and correcting the three forms of treatment non-adherence:   

  1. Non-fulfillment: not filling prescriptions 
  1. Non-persistence: quitting medication without seeking medical advice 
  1. Non-conforming: taking medications incorrectly or skipping doses 

With a prescription integration, you can put out the tiny fires—such as forgetfulness or lack of engagement—before they turn into much larger flames. Prescription tool failures have included things like contributing to the 20-30% wasteful healthcare costs and 125,000 annual deaths caused by medication non-adherence. For each hurdle presented, your integrated resources can make significant differences. 

First Challenge: Non-Fulfillment 

Often, non-adherence simply lies with whether patients access their treatment plans at all. Patients are known to forgo filling their prescriptions due to cost, forgetfulness, transportation issues, or (literally) crippling procrastination habits. Prescription integration allows you to meet patients halfway on some matters: 

  • A staged treatment approach introduces treatments one at a time, staying within patients’ financial limits. 
  • Automated refill reminders help busy and procrastinating patients remember their treatment in case they forgot or have been putting it off. 
  • Automatic shipping on orders removes the manual process of requesting treatment shipments so patients can get their orders on time. 

Such integration allows you to eliminate patients’ barriers to medication adherence, like financial parameters and busy lives, and give them the care they need. 

Second Challenge: Non-Persistence 

doctor hands medication to patient

The patients that stop treatment do so for many reasons. Cost, forgetfulness, procrastination, or transportation issues can bar patients from adhering to treatment. Another area for improvement is a lack of engagement with your practice, leaving them on their own to navigate unfamiliar territory. With a prescription integration, you maintain contact with patients and monitor their engagement with treatment plans.  

There’s also the advantage of keeping a close eye on how patients are doing with their treatment. Prescription management tools like intakeQ’s eRX can show whether patients activate their accounts or participate in their treatment plans. Its dashboard also lets you know if they have outstanding refills, which signals they’ve stopped treatment. If so, you can quickly intervene with a text or email. 

Third Challenge: Non-Conforming 

The third form of non-adherence highlights the importance of effective communication and understanding between you and your patients. When patients don’t adhere to the specific guidelines of their treatment plans, they may not be aware of the complications that could result from their actions. 

A prescription management tool can give you a way to identify non-conforming patients. Those who refill prescriptions irregularly indicate they aren’t taking their treatment as prescribed. To intervene, you can reach out through their preferred contact method to remind them of their regimen. 

Another reason they may not stick to your directions is that there was no collaboration in the plan. With the tools in your prescription management software, you can create enough room for you and the patient to design a treatment that works for them. By introducing flexible, individualized treatments with staged approaches, you’re encouraging patients to adhere to the plan. 

How Your Practice Benefits from Prescription Integration 

Your practice has a lot to gain by integrating prescriptions with your practice management software. According to Fullscript’s statistics regarding integration, your practice can expect significant improvements: 

  • Increased revenue by 16% 
  • 33% more prescriptions written per week 
  • Reduced staff burden with simplified, digital workflow  

Also, by improving patients’ treatment adherence, your practice will provide higher quality care. And with better care that results from following medication guidelines, your CMS Star Rating (or Medicare Star Rating) increases. The CMS outlines that the goal for medication adherence is 80%. To get this percentage, the Proportion of Days Covered (PDC) figures in the days that patients have treatment, along with the total number of days in that period.  

With a higher PDC calculation and CMS Star Rating, Medicare consumers looking for providers within their health and drug plans will be drawn to your practice, growing your practice with new patients. 

The Total Patient Adherence Package 

Integrating your practice’s software with a prescription management tool can help your practice address many challenges with getting patients to adhere to treatment. Multi-tasking software, such as intakeQ, offers advanced solutions for every part of your practice.  

Forms, billing, and prescription management with eRX allow you to manage every aspect of the patient process, including all versions of treatment non-adherence.  

Plus, along with healthier patients and lower healthcare costs, your practice has a lot to gain. Increased revenue, more prescriptions, streamlined workflows, and a higher CMS Star Rating are plenty of reasons to start integrating your prescriptions today. 

References 

Best Ways to Automate Your Virtual Dispensary. (2021, January 27). Fullscript. https://fullscript.com/blog/automate-your-virtual-dispensary 

Ding, A., Dixon, S. W., Ferries, E. A., & Shrank, W. H. (2022). The role of integrated medical and prescription drug plans in addressing racial and ethnic disparities in medication adherence. Journal of Managed Care & Specialty Pharmacy, 28(3), 379–386. https://doi.org/10.18553/jmcp.2022.28.3.379 

Dixon, B. E., Alzeer, A. H., Phillips, E. O., & Marrero, D. G. (2016). Integration of Provider, Pharmacy, and Patient-Reported Data to Improve Medication Adherence for Type 2 Diabetes: A Controlled Before-After Pilot Study. JMIR Medical Informatics, 4(1), e4. https://doi.org/10.2196/medinform.4739 

How Medication Adherence Impacts Medicare Star Ratings. (2021, September 15). ExactCare Pharmacy. https://www.exactcarepharmacy.com/about-exactcare/news/how-medication-adherence-impacts-medicare-star-ratings/ 

Jimmy, B., & Jose, J. (2011). Patient Medication Adherence: Measures in Daily Practice. Oman Medical Journal, 26(3), 155–159. https://doi.org/10.5001/omj.2011.38 

McGuire, M., & Iuga, A. (2014). Adherence and health care costs. Risk Management and Healthcare Policy, 7, 35. https://doi.org/10.2147/rmhp.s19801 

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