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Tag: medication management
05/22/2023

Addiction Recovery Provider Uses AI to Monitor Telehealth Meds for Opioid Use Disorder

Article Excerpt: In senior living communities and nursing homes, it’s often a challenge to keep residents with opioid-use disorder in treatment and monitor their medications when they can’t visit the doctor. An addiction medicine practice in Indiana found a fix by creating a platform combining smartphone and AI technology to connect patients with doctors and help providers comply with treatment regulations.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/9xuzfu5y

Article Source: McKnights Senior Living

01/31/2023

PTSD Study Uses Precision Medicine Tech from AiCure

Article Excerpt: AiCure’s AI-powered digital biomarker solution enables remote detection of subtle changes in a patient’s health status and response to treatment by capturing audio and visual data between clinic visits. Accessed through AiCure’s Patient Connect application, patients use their smartphone’s front-facing camera to complete brief assessments. AiCure’s algorithm then analyzes behavior, such as emotional expressivity, physical movement and speech patterns. By frequently aggregating these sensitive, objective insights, AiCure empowers pharmaceutical companies to improve their understanding of the disease and treatment side effects, elevating the integrity of their trial data, and optimizing patient outcomes.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/yystxpws

Article Source: Applied Clinical Trials

12/12/2022

Quit Genius Reports Promising Data in Pilot Study of Integrated Digital Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) Treatment

Article Excerpt: Quit Genius, the world’s first digital clinic for treating multiple substance addictions, today announced results from a pilot study of integrated alcohol use disorder (AUD) treatment. The study, one of the most promising of its kind to date, shows the potential for combined behavioral health and medication management delivered via telehealth to dramatically improve outcomes and boost access to quality substance use care. A fully powered randomized controlled trial (RCT) building on the initial success of the pilot investigation is now underway.

Full Articlehttps://tinyurl.com/4b4ywt2h

Article Source: Street Insider

09/27/2022

Telehealth improves Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder

Article Excerpt: During the COVID-19 pandemic, health agencies used emergency authorities to allow opioid treatment programs to provide care via telehealth and to remotely prescribe medications for opioid use disorder. Knowing whether patients benefited from these changes could affect whether they will remain in place. But studies addressing this question have thus far been limited in scope. A team of NIH and other federal researchers examined telehealth use, treatment engagement, and overdoses under the emergency authorities… The researchers looked at how well the people receiving medications continued their treatment. They found that those who received telehealth service were more likely to keep getting their medications. Importantly, those receiving telehealth service also had a lower risk of overdose.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/5ba9p3f8

Article Source: NIH News

09/05/2022

Effect of Digital Adherence Tools on Adherence to Antiretroviral Treatment Among Adults Living With HIV in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Sumari-de Boer IM, Ngowi, KM, Sonda TB, Pima FM, Masika LV, Sprangers MAG, Reiss P, Mmbaga BT, Nieuwkerk PT, Aarnoutse RE. (2021). Effect of Digital Adherence Tools on Adherence to Antiretroviral Treatment Among Adults Living With HIV in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania: A Randomized Controlled Trial. JAIDS Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes, 87:5, 1136-1144, doi: 10.1097/QAI.0000000000002695

This study investigated two digital antiretroviral HIV treatment adherence interventions among adults with suboptimal adherence living in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania using a parallel 3-arm, non-blinded, randomized controlled trial with 1:1:1 allocation. In one arm, 80 participants received reminder text messages (SMS) on 3 random days a week. In the second arm, 82 participants received a real-time medication monitoring device (RTMM) called Wisepill with SMS reminders. The device contains antiretroviral treatment, and each opening is registered and sent to an Internet server. If participants do not open before the end of the dosage window, a text reminder is sent. In the third arm, 81 participants received treatment as usual according to Tanzanian guidelines (minimal adherence counseling by nurses or pharmacists and annual viral load test). Proportion of participants who have sufficient treatment adherence (>85% of doses) was collected at enrollment and every 8 weeks for 48 weeks (total of 7 timepoints) using pharmacy refill counts and self-report. Over 48 weeks, no significant difference in self-reported adherence was found between the three arms. The average adherence based on pharmacy refills was also not significantly different across the three arms. None of the intervention arms showed a significant effect on viral suppression rates. Overall, the study’s findings do not support the use of RTMM or SMS reminder cues as a means to significantly improve adherence to HIV treatment. The difference in pharmacy refill counts compared to self-reported adherence might be due to social desirability and overreporting in all arms. More research is needed to explore how digital interventions can be used to optimize adherence across risk groups, including children, youth, and pregnant or breastfeeding women.

08/24/2022

ONC, CDC say Integration Framework Can Combat Opioid Crisis

Article Excerpt: For the past five years, the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have been working together on an interactive resource for states and health systems called the Integration Framework. The tool is meant to give guidance to help improve integration of state prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) within clinicians’ workflows. It includes best practices for implementing advanced clinical decision support systems to help flag potential opioid abuse, and it outlines steps to help advance and scale PDMP integration with IT systems, such as electronic health records, health information exchanges and pharmacy systems.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/2w5z9smr

Article Source: Health IT News

06/21/2022

This Pitt Researcher Is Using Data to Fight the Opioid Epidemic

Article Excerpt: Pennsylvania’s opioid epidemic knows no boundaries or borders. It touches rural and urban areas, former steel towns and bustling downtowns. And approaches to fighting the epidemic are as diverse as the people it impacts. Pitt’s Jeanine Buchanich, a research associate professor in the School of Public Health, is taking a big-picture approach to figuring out what programs will best tackle the problem. Since 2019, she has partnered with the Pennsylvania Department of Health to evaluate community-based programs using data tracking and analysis, funded by an Overdose Data to Action grant from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Buchanich has evaluated public health interventions as varied as community-level training for first responders on naloxone use and stigma reduction; county and municipal health department prevention efforts; the Patient Advocacy Program, which helps patients who have been prescribed controlled substances; local and statewide provider education efforts and Pennsylvania’s Prescription Drug Monitoring Program.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/ms33x589

Article Source: University of Pittsburgh Pittwire

06/17/2022

How Technology Can Help Providers Fight Back Against the Opioid Epidemic

Article Excerpt: Healthcare information technology has opened new doors to understanding opioid addiction, but there still are areas where data and innovation can help medical professionals better handle this crisis, contends Reema Hammoud, PharmD, assistant vice president of clinical pharmacy at Sedgwick, a vendor of technology-enabled risk, benefits and integrated business systems. The COVID-19 pandemic is a major health crisis that has taken center stage, but the still-rising opioid crisis is a large-scale epidemic that cannot be overlooked. It is a crisis in desperate need of innovative solutions, and certainly technology can be one sector that provides them.

Full Article: https://tinyurl.com/58rjxwaz

Article Source: Healthcare IT News

03/23/2022

The Future of Pharmacy is Digital

Article Excerpt: New career paths are appearing in pharmacy, and these career paths are digital ones. The FDA is approving growing numbers of digital products to monitor and treat patients, building on a growing acceptance of wearable products to monitor health, health apps to guide daily activities, smart pill dispensers to monitor and improve adherence, and much more. “Technology is changing the patient journey,” said Timothy Aungst, PharmD, Associate Professor of Pharmacy Practice at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. “Digital health is mainstream, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic and telehealth. We need to catch up with digital resources, not stay tied to legacy approaches. Digital health needs digital pharmacists.”

Full Article: https://www.drugtopics.com/view/the-future-of-pharmacy-is-digital

Article Source: Drug Topics