Medisafe Hypertension Users Stay on Therapy Two-Thirds Longer than Non-users
CHICAGO, IL — September 7, 2018. Medisafe, the leading medication management platform with over four and a half million registered users, released data today showing that hypertensive patients on the mobile health app, Medisafe, have a rate of therapy persistence almost 2.5 times or 136 percent that of a matched control cohort over a 12-month period, with the disparity increasing further over time. These results are part of ongoing research conducted with IQVIA, a leading global provider of advanced analytics, technology solutions and clinical development services to the life sciences industry.
In the study therapy persistence is defined as the percent of patients who have continued to fill their anti-hypertensive medication, allowing for up to a 60-day refill gap. The control cohort was matched 3:1 to the Medisafe cohort – 12,000 patients in the control compared to 4,000 on Medisafe – with the two groups sharing comparable profiles in regards to demographics, previous time on therapy, and payer mix. To track persistence for Medisafe users, prescription activity for the app users was compared to the prescription activity of the matched non-app users. All data was de-identified to a HIPAA standard and matched using IQVIA’s LRx database.
(Click here for the research abstract)
Key findings:
- At 12 months, persistence for app users was 81.4% compared to 34.5% for control.
- At 24 months, persistence for app users was 70.9% compared to 17.2% for control
- Mean time on therapy was 10.9 months for app users compared to 6.5 months in control
Previous observational research studies have shown that adherent hypertension patients, who remain on therapy for up to 12 months, have up to a 26 percent reduction in hospitalization risk.1
In May of this year, Medisafe released results revealing that 78 percent of previously non-adherent anti-hypertensive patients improve their medication possession ratio (‘MPR’) by over 20 percent on Medisafe. MPR is an industry standard measure of adherence based on frequency of prescription refills.
“In follow-up to the first set of hypertension data we shared a few months ago, we are pleased to present these persistence results showing that Medisafe not only improves prescription refill rates but also keeps patients on therapy far longer,” says Jon Michaeli, EVP of Strategic Partnerships at Medisafe. “As we continue releasing additional data from the study in the coming months, we will illustrate that the hypertension findings are generalizable to and repeatable with a broader set of chronic conditions, where there is even greater cumulative benefit to health outcomes and cost of care.”
“Persistence on therapy is critical when managing chronic hypertensive patients to minimize risk of end-organ damage and thus reduce their risks of health deterioration,” explains Dr. Irv Loh, preventive cardiologist at the Ventura Heart Institute. “These promising data demonstrate that digital tools, such as Medisafe, can significantly impact patient behavior and therapeutic adherence with commensurate improvement in long-term outcome. Reducing healthcare costs by implementing management tools like Medisafe across chronic disease populations could have very meaningful economic impact.”
The hypertension persistence results follow multiple findings released from the same research including results showing statistically significant improvement in medication adherence for hypertensive patients and HIV patients. Medisafe has also shown that its self-reported adherence data are consistent with prescription refill claims.
The Medisafe team will be available at the American Society of Hypertension Scientific Sessions in Chicago on Saturday, September 8 from 1:30 to 3:00pm CDT to present the study poster (Board P358) and discuss the results. To schedule a meeting, please click here.
About Medisafe
Medisafe is the personalized medication management platform addressing all major causes of non-adherence, a $300 billion problem in the US alone. Medisafe’s cloud-based mobile platform personalizes content, resources and interventions — such as educational videos, coupons and motivational messages — based on each user’s regimen, condition and specific circumstance. Medisafe fosters collaboration among patients, their loved ones and healthcare professionals through caregiver tools and reports, and helps the healthcare professionals improve health outcomes and sustain quality care initiatives. Medisafe is a HIPAA and GDPR compliant solution and ISO 27001:2013 certified. Medisafe’s 4.5 million registered patient and caregiver users who have recorded over one billion successful medication doses on their iOS and Android smartphones and tablets and contributed 180,000 user reviews that average 4.5 out of 5 stars in the App Store and Google Play app stores.
1 Sokol MC, McGuigan KA, Verbrugge RR, Epstein RS. Impact of medication adherence on hospitalization risk and healthcare cost. Med Care. 2005;43:521–530. doi: 10.1097/01.mlr.0000163641.86870.af.