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How can you “make” your employees take their medications?

Wow, did we really say that?  Your goals shouldn’t be to “make” your employees do anything, but rather to encourage and support them in making good decisions about their health care, right?

But let’s face it, getting patients to take their medications, on time and correctly, is a huge challenge and always has been.  We know some of the reasons patients don’t take medications which have been prescribed for them, intuitively.  Right?  Those reasons include cost (co-payments, etc.); the inconvenience (driving to the pharmacy and waiting); the complexity of the schedule and remembering when the next dose is due; or maybe just having a place to take their medications privately while at work (especially things like insulin shots and inhalers that are more obvious when taken).

Twenty-eight percent of all newly-written prescriptions are never filled and  a large portion of those are for medications used for chronic disease treatment like high blood pressure and diabetes.  And in a CVS Caremark study, it was found that 24% of people who didn’t follow their drug regimens said that it was because they felt the medication interfered with their social life and/or “became a chore.”  Surprisingly, another 21% in this study said that “stopping their medication was sometimes a way to resist authority.”  Who would have guessed it?   Finally, 17% in this same study said that the “regimen made them feel old.”

How do you get around this?  Taking prescribed medications consistently and correctly is a huge factor in successfully managing many disease processes.  If the patients aren’t willing, how can you help them?

Some things others have tried – e-mail reminders, changing copayments to reduce or eliminate cost barriers (especially for medications needed to treat chronic conditions), and providing group/peer sessions-which may include practitioners-to get questions and concerns about side effects , etc., out in the open so they can be addressed.  Communication seems to be a key factor.  So if the patient doesn’t have access to physicians (with enough time), nurse educators, and pharmacists who are focused on helping them understand the benefits of taking their medications, what can we expect?