Reuters Events | Pharma

Thought leadership and innovation for the Pharmaceutical Industry

Over a decade ago, the National Council on Patient Information and Education (NCPIE) recognised the need for a coordinated approach to improved medication adherence and issued a report-Prescription Me

Over a decade ago, the National Council on Patient Information and Education (NCPIE) recognised the need for a coordinated approach to improved medication adherence and issued a report-Prescription Medicine: A review of the Baseline Knowledge. NCPIE has just produced a new report Enhancing Prescription Medicine Adherence: A National Action Plan, which analyses methods for improving Americas other drug problem
http://www.talkaboutrx.org/documents/enhancing_prescription_medicine_adh...

It argues that there are ten key principles that need to be addressed. These range from elevating patient adherence as a critical health care issue to creating the means to chare information about best practices in adherence, education and management, and have a unified system of measuring these.

With the number of product launches decreasing and patents coming to an end, Pharma have finally started to think about compliance. But has enough been done? Most of big pharma have started to employ personnel devoted to compliance, but how long will it take for new policies to filter through? The World Health Organisation (WHO) projects that only 50% of patients take their medicines as prescribed. There is no question that pharma has the opportunity to make big profits the question is how. The key is for all stakeholders to work together. This is something that the NCPIEs first report argued and their second stresses.