It’s tough to find an excuse for forgetting to take your medications nowadays. And if you’re thinking of a good excuse right now, chances are that companies and technologists in the Boston area have already addressed it with an information technology invention.
Poor adherence to medications has been a bugaboo in the healthcare system for a long time. When sick patients don’t take their meds, they often get even sicker and end up in the hospital. The problem is expensive because of all the extra care these patients need. So it has caught the attention of entrepreneurs from MIT and physicians affiliated with Harvard Medical School, leading to the creation of several IT devices or services that are gaining more traction in the healthcare field.
Eran Shavelsky, for one, says he formed his Newton, MA-based startup, MedMinder Systems, after learning about the challenge of getting patients to take their medications while he attended the Sloan School of Management at MIT several years ago. In May, his firm launched an electronic pill box called “Maya” that uses wireless technology and sensors to alert patents with chronic diseases when they don’t take their pills on time.
Health insurance companies have a reason to pay attention to such efforts: patients who don’t take their medicine when they’re supposed to cost the U.S. healthcare system a mind-boggling
