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Medication Adherence: The Evolving Role Of Technology

 

If you are a member of Sermo, I invite you to join our discussion when it comes to medication adherence (comments will be closed on this post otherwise). To go directly to the sermo post and discussion, click here. Even if you are not a member of sermo, I invite you to check out our CME series over at CMECorner.com/ADHE. Here is some background information.

Medication adherence remains a persistent and pertinent issue in health care. Nonadherence poses challenges to adequate control of the target condition and often leads to further unnecessary complications.  Lapses in adherence can lead to more severe and expensive disease exacerbations, requiring additional treatment and hospitalization.  Rates and reasons for noncompliance vary based on numerous factors including health condition, type of medication, and patient characteristics.

Primary care physicians (PCPs) treat patients with chronic conditions, who often find it difficult to adhere to their medication regimens.  Many of the latest practice management and communication technologies afford clinicians the opportunity improve patient medication adherence. Functions within electronic health records (EHRs), such as medication alerts and eprescibing; via social media, including blogs and patient communities; and through mobile technology and digital communication, utilizing tools like HIPAA-compliant texts, can help physicians to improve their patients’ adherence to their course of therapy. Recent video roundtable discussions on CMECorner.com strived to educate PCPs about these technologies.

There are already a lot of comments over on the sermo post. And, I admit that I have not used that platform that much. But, I have been pleasantly surprised by the discussion and response that has already occurred. If you plan to comment over there, please do it sooner rather than later, in that comments will close over there in the next few days. Thanks for your feedback on this project!

Family Medicine Rocks Michigan

The Family Medicine Rocks Revolution is spreading to Michigan! Of course I had nothing to do with this video (watch out for the catchy music here), but I'm gonna try to ride their coattails on this one LOL. The Michigan Academy of Family Physicians (of whom I have many friends up there), put together this creative video which makes statements like "We [Family Medicine] specialize in you, for life."

Now, this is the kind of stuff that I hope more Family Medicine organizations so when it comes to social media. I have written in the past why I believe Family Medicine Needs Social Media. Kudos to the Michigan Academy of Family Physicians for putting this together. Are there other examples of creative social media by Family Medicine organizations? Let me know. I would love to highlight them here because, yes, Family Medicine Rocks!

NJAFP11: Social Media And Family Medicine

Above is a video with a portion of my presentation at the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians meeting which is their Scientific Assembly & Summer Celebration. Thanks to the NJAFP for the opportunity to speak on a topic that I'm passionate about, and I hope that it shows through above. I also encourage you to check out some of the other videos that were recorded, including their House of Delegates session and their resolution to encourage AAFP to leave the RUC. I'll also try to talk about some other sessions in future blog posts.

NJAFP Approves Resolution For RUC Withdrawal

As I previously blogged, the annual meeting of the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians is going on this weekend in Atlantic City. Start watching at minute 43 in the video above for the debate in discussion of the resolution about encouraging the AAFP to withdraw from the RUC. This debate may be a little preview of the discussion that will take place at the American Academy of Family Physicians Congress of Delegates meeting in September in Orlando. Also included at the beginning of the video above are the remarks of the incoming president of the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians. 

Live From Atlantic City

I invite you to join me this weekend at the New Jersey Academy of Famliy Physicians Summer Celebration and annual meeting which will be taking place in Atlantic City beginning today. The twitter hashtag of #NJAFP11 will be used during the meeting. You can also follow their twitter stream @NJAFPMeetings.

In addition to usual social media platforms, this meeting is unique in that for the past 2 years, they have taken the extra step of broadcasting parts of the meeting - live on the internet via ustream. Check out NJFamilyDoc.Org for all the information about the meeting, including the broadcast of live sessions.

Finally, I invite you to check out my presentation on Social Media and Family Medicine which will take place live on the internet on Saturday, June 18, 2011 at around 11am Eastern Daylight Time. I'll be co-presenting with Ray Saputelli who is the Executive Vice President of the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians.

Saturday's presentation about Social Media and Family Medicine will be similar to the one that was done in New Orleans at the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine meeting last month. Also check out my video post promo above. See you Live From Atlantic City!

Blogiversary on FamMedRocks Podcast 12

Hope you can join me for the latest installment of the Family Medicine Rocks podcast which will be in Tuesday, June 14, 2011 at 9pm Eastern Time on BlogTalkRadio. June celebrates two important things. First this the birthday of being a blogger the "Doctor Anonymous" blog was born five years ago this month. Secondly, this month is the birthday of me - YAY!

As outlined in the video above, one of the main topics will be the idea of "Social Media success." How do you define this for yourself? How do you define this for other people? I get this question A LOT, and it's pretty difficult for me to answer. But, I'll try to do that in the course of the show.

I'll also be talking about the passing of a friend of family medicine last week. I had a little blog rant on it yesterday. Depending on what happens before the show starts, I may continue with the rant. Finally, I'll be lecturing in Atlantic City this coming weekend at the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians annual meeting. The topic? Of course, family medicine and social media.

So, I hope you can join me for the recording of the live podcast. Even if you cannot, you can always download the archived podcast later and listen at your leisure. Hope to see you for the show!

Passing of Family Medicine Friend & Our Silence

On twitter this morning at around 9am eastern time, I was disheartened by the tweet by @dockj at the Family Medicine Program Directors Workshop: "Stunning gasps at announcement of sudden passing of Dr Barbara Starfield." I hadn't heard anything about this either. So, I did a quick search to find a statement from Dr. Rich Roberts from June 12th - a portion of which stated the following:

The news of the sudden death of Professor Barbara Starfield, apparently due to a coronary event while swimming at her California home on Friday, 10 June 2011, came as a shock. Her passing is an irreplaceable loss for those of us in the global community who care deeply about health care and equity. 

I never met Dr. Starfield, but it was always a professional goal of mine to try to run into her at one of these Family Medicine meetings to try to gain some wisdom from her. I was able to find the video above of her speaking and accepting a lifetime achievement award. She seemed like an amazing woman and undoubtedly a friend and advocate of Family Medicine and primary care.

Now, those of you from twitter who were baited by my tagline "Why the Family Medicine community should be ashamed of itself." What do I mean by that? Well, it was only through social media - specifically twitter - where I learned of this news. Throughout the morning and early afternoon, various google searches revealed short blurbs from Johns Hopkins, Health Equity, Medical Humanities blog, and the Arizona Academy of Family Physicians.

Then, at approximately 5pm eastern time today, the first substantive article was released by the Health Affairs blog. This is a very well written article and I recommend people check it out. In addition, they are making available free access until June 28, the articles she authored and co-authored.

Health Affairs extends its deepest sympathies to the family and friends of Dr. Starfield. To help honor Dr. Starfield’s career, Health Affairs is providing free access until June 28 to the full texts of the articles she has authored and coauthored in the journal...

But, for the entire day, I'm looking for an extensive article from one of the major Family Medicine organization - like the American Academy of Family Physicians or Society of Teachers of Family Medicine (she was beloved in the academic and research world, right?). Even scanning the major Family Medicine blogs - nothing. I mean people are more than happy to blog about legislative issues like leaving the RUC, or health care reform, or partnering with companies like Coca-Cola. But to be silent on the passing of one of the friends of Family Medicine? That really bothers me.

I'll be ranting more about this on my podcast on Tuesday night. But, I'm really hoping by then that the Family Medicine community and its social media supporters - I hope that they recognize, pay tribute, or at least even mention, the passing of Dr. Starfield who gave this specialty a voice. Hopefully we will not forget her with our silence....

Drug Interactions

When people talk about prescription medications, everyone is familiar with the concept of side effects from medication. But, did you know that there are things in your diet that may interfere with your prescription medication?

In addition, your prescription medication may interfere with over the counter medications. In the video above, there are two interviews recorded on Wednesday, June 8, 2011 on local TV news. If you find the information above helpful, I invite you to check out other TV interviews on medical/health issues at MikeSevilla.TV

Ohio Hospital Assoc on Social Media

The annual meeting of the Ohio Hospital Association is coming up next week in Columbus. I was alerted on the video promo above from their twitter feed and from their youtube channel. Now, this is not their first venture into social media.

However, with today's first Ohio live tweeting of surgery at Ohio State University Medical Center and previous discussion of the Ohio State Medical Association embracing social media, I really feel the major medical organizations of this state taking some major steps this year to show the importance of social media at the organizational level.

Something that I hope will happen is that important groups like patients and legislators take notice of this - particularly with the upcoming presidential election cycle. We know how people like politicians, entertainers, the media, and others have used social media. The medical community in Ohio needs more experience in this area and the steps that have been taken in the past few months are very encouraging...