Mail-Order Pharmacy Use May Improve Drug Adherence
by -- Jane Parry Updated: Jan 22nd 2010
FRIDAY, Jan. 22 (HealthDay News) -- Patients who refill prescriptions for diabetes medications by mail order have higher rates of drug adherence than their counterparts who refill at local pharmacies, according to a study in the January issue of the American Journal of Managed Care.
O. Kenrik Duru, M.D., of the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California in Los Angeles, and colleagues conducted a study of 13,922 patients from the Kaiser Permanente Northern California diabetes registry who refilled an antiglycemic, antihypertensive or lipid-lowering index medication prescription.
The researchers found that good adherence to their drug regimen, defined as having medication available at least 80 percent of the time, was higher among those who refilled prescriptions by mail (84.7 percent versus 76.9 percent for those who refilled at local pharmacies). The association held even after adjusting for potential confounders, such as out-of-pocket costs, the investigators note, but the practice was less prevalent among patients from ethnic minorities and lower socioeconomic groups.
"Our findings also suggest the intriguing potential of larger organization-level interventions to improve adherence by promoting increased mail-order use," the authors write. "Despite their potential benefits, interventions to increase mail-order pharmacy use would need to be carefully designed and implemented to avoid inadvertently harming patients. Such interventions should not come at the expense of face-to-face pharmacist time needed to clarify dosing schedules or check for adverse drug interactions, including dietary supplements or over-the-counter medications."
