Content about Medical terms

ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, Fla. — A specialty pharmacy provider has launched an application that it said will reduce the administrative burden of reimbursement, writing prescriptions, monitoring adherence and reviewing drug lists.

BioPlus Specialty Pharmacy announced the launch of TAP App, short for Therapy Access Portal, designed to allow physicians to monitor patients from initial intake through benefit verification and shipping, and make data on adherence issues, medication possession ratios, adverse drug reactions and other issues more easily available.

WOONSOCKET, R.I. — CVS Caremark issued on Tuesday two new reports that highlight research the company is conducting around medication adherence, including one study that reviews and compares state-by-state adherence rates for patients managing four chronic diseases.
 

WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT'S IMPORTANT — There is power in information. There is even more power in that information when it is conveniently available at the precise moment it is needed — in this case, during one of a patient's increasingly time-crunched appointments with a general healthcare practitioner. Today more than half (52%) of all office-based doctors are using that Surescripts network to streamline and help manage the prescriptions they write, which is connecting them to 94% of all retail pharmacies.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Walgreens Specialty Pharmacy on Thursday released data showing that both patients and their health plans can realize savings of up to 60% on the cost of infused specialty medications by choosing alternate treatment sites. The cost savings was the key finding from new data being presented at the 2012 Pharmacy Benefit Management Institute Annual Drug Benefit Conference in Scottsdale, Ariz.


WASHINGTON — Most new and renewed health plans will be required to cover preventive services for women without cost sharing starting in August, according to guidelines announced Friday by the Department of Health and Human Services.

HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced the guidelines, part of the Affordable Care Act, saying that preventive services, including contraceptive services, would become available to insured women without co-pay, co-insurance or deductible starting Aug. 1.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Medication adherence is as high or slightly better among patients filling 90-day prescriptions at retail versus mail order, according to a new Walgreens study published in the November issue of the American Journal of Managed Care that the chain highlighted Thursday.

According to the study, adherence levels for 90-day at retail were 77%, while at mail-order adherence levels were 76%.

NEW YORK — A new law in Washington state intended to curb accidental deaths related to opioid painkillers is having some adverse side effects, according to published reports.

ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, Fla. — BioPlus Specialty Pharmacy announced that it now is allowing physicians to electronically submit prescriptions to its pharmacies.

BioPlus said its e-prescribing offering is designed to lessen the risk of errors, lower costs and improve compliance. The use of computerized medication order entry potentially could prevent up to 84% of dose, frequency and route errors in medication use, according to data from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality,a Department of Health and Human Services agency.

BALTIMORE — CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield and Cardinal Health Specialty Solutions on Tuesday launched the nation's first clinical pathways program for rheumatoid arthritis, a chronic disease that leads to inflammation of the joints and surrounding tissue and affects nearly 2.1 million Americans each year.

While medication nonadherence is a perennial problem that costs the healthcare system $290 billion per year, one of the least explored facets of it is primary nonadherence, when patients receive new prescriptions on paper or electronically and never drop them off or pick them up. But some researchers hope to change that.


ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The National Community Pharmacists Association on Monday launched Simplify My Meds, an innovative adherence program that provides pharmacists with the tools to help coordinate patients’ prescription refills to a single day of the month, for its independent community pharmacy members.

The new model facilitates a more comprehensive and coordinated level of pharmacy care, reduces the potential for gaps in therapy and promotes improved medication adherence, the NCPA stated.

NEW YORK — Mandatory mail seems to cause some patients to prematurely discontinue therapy, especially among those patients without previous mail-service pharmacy experience. At least, that’s what a recent study on mandatory mail suggested.

The CVS Caremark-funded study, “Adherence to Medication Under Mandatory and Voluntary Mail Benefit Designs,” recently was published in the American Journal of Managed Care.