Designing the Trigger
The main reasons why people do not take medication are :
- They forget to take their medication.
- Lack of knowledge about their condition/medication.
- They get demotivated with their condition and lose hope.
Let’s discuss each of these reasons in detail and brainstorm possible ‘trigger’ solutions.
1. Forgetting
This is the most common cause of patients missing their medication. The patient may struggle with remembering to take medications daily, perhaps causing the patient to take an inappropriately delayed dose, to take an unscheduled medication holiday, or to inadvertently take an extra dose. Let’s break it further into different kinds and brainstorm possible solutions.
(a) Forgetting to take medication altogether.
These people just need a system which tracks their medicine routines and need a trigger which tells them to do the action at a particular time. The differentiator in our solution should be that the trigger could only be switched off when the action is completed. This would make it more effective than any other alarm app.
Trigger : A simple voice reminder for the medication. Repeated reminders can talk about the function and benefits to motivate the patient into taking action. In urgent cases, talking about the harmful repercussions can also be used as a tactic. As a last retort, non adherence would be reported in the system and the caregiver can intervene and check with the patient. Involving a second person, and adding accountability becomes another tactic.
(b) Forgetting to take them on time.
This problem can also be solved by a system which gives timely reminders and would not go off until the action is completed. Moreover, if reminders are clubbed with existing habits or routines, it becomes easier to latch on to new activities for patients.
Trigger : The medicine reminders can also be clubbed with existing habits or rituals of the patient. The caregivers can help identify such habits and set up reminders. It can be real life habits like — breakfast time, morning meditation, evening walk, or dinner time. It can also be digital habits like — listening to news feed from the voice assistants, playing meditation tunes on Spotify, playing music, listening to new recipes or even listening to podcasts. Each such activity can be seen as a trigger for a particular medicine reminder.
(c) Forgetting to refill medication.
With a solution like Pill Pack Plus which tracks how many dosages of medication are left, refilling becomes automated through the system.
(d) Forgetting if they have already taken their medicine.
An IOT smart medication dispenser would only dispense medication when it is the appropriate time. This relieves the patient from keeping a track of their medication.
(e) Forgetting where did they keep their medication
In our solution, as the device would be always plugged in (like any other voice assistant) patients can easily associate one location with their medicine dispensers. Moreover, you can always verbally ask about its whereabouts.
(f) Forgetting to carry medication ***
(g) Forgetting which medication to take at what time.
Already resolved by the concept of Pill Pack.
2. Lack of knowledge about their medication / condition.
Another barrier to effective use of medicines is inadequate knowledge about a drug and its function. It is important to focus on educating the patient on the purpose of the medication, explaining the reasons why the medication is prescribed, explaining the importance of long-term medication use, discussing how the medication should be taken, and alerting the patient about the potential problems or side effects that should be anticipated.
Other barriers to the effective use of medicines include : Pre conceived beliefs about medicines, not being convinced of the need for treatment and fear of adverse effects of the drug in the long term.
Trigger : As discussed before, the trigger for medicine reminder could be in the form of information about the function of the medicine. It can highlight the benefits when taken over a period of time. It can also caution the patient about the side effects of medication to prepare them for it. It can also give easy to understand statistical data about the benefits of a particular medicine. Addressing common myths and provide factual information about a drug (like fun facts) could be a useful way of integrating information with triggers.
3. Lack of Motivation
Although it is very difficult to gauge a patient’s motivation and design triggers according to that, we can do a fair job if the caregivers report this as one of the reasons for the lack of adherence.
Trigger : In a future scenario when we imagine a lot of people using this system for their medication, we can use the interactive feature of the solution to inspire new patients with the experience of seasoned patients in dealing with a condition. Motivating anecdotes or short tales of patients who have successfully battled their conditions can be played as triggers for reminding patients to stick to their regimes.
