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Disease Management and Drug Adherence:  Strategies to support patients and enhance treatment persistence

Failure to take medication as prescribed significantly increases the risk that patients will experience complications resulting in injury or death, and propagate higher healthcare costs overall. The medical establishment's approach to adherence is changing as it becomes clear that the responsibility of achieving adherence is not solely the patient's, but rather is shared among stakeholders.

Physicians who do not take the time to understand their patients can negatively impact adherence by failing to take into consideration factors that may make it difficult for patients to follow a medication regimen. This can lead to physicians prescribing treatments that are prohibitively complex or missing opportunities to provide support services.

The ideal approach would involve collaboration between a variety of stakeholders, including physicians, patient groups, payers and the pharmaceutical industry. However, collaboration has proven to be complicated, not least of all because there is little or no consensus about how to define or measure adherence.

Reaching customers through customized interactions will help to make them feel as though they are valued and understood by the company. Furthermore, as regards disease management programs in particular, the more accurately targeted the program the more likely it is to effect a behavioral change in the patient.

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