Smart Pills: A Prescription for the Future?

By Winnona Carter - Medical Research Editor | January 27th, 2012

Smartphones have revolutionized many things. One such thing is health. Individuals can now download applications for fitness, wellness and health cooking. And now they can download information from their smart pills.

A Daily Mail article announced the approval of the sale and use of smart pills in Great Britain. The pills let patients and their doctors know when and if medication is being taken and if it is being taken as directed.
The Helius smart pills were developed by Proteus Biomedical, a firm based in the United States. The firm has a partnership with Lloyds Pharmacy of the United Kingdom.

The smart pill is taken along with a tablet that has a tiny edible sensor embedded in it. The sensor is about the size of a grain of rice and made up of food ingredients. Stomach fluids activate the sensor, and then send a signal to a shoulder or arm patch that acts as a receiver.

The receiver tracks when and what prescribed drugs were taken, the dosage amount of the medication, and it also monitors the patient’s heart rate and body temperature. Additionally, the device lets a patient know when a dosage is due, records sleeping patterns and exercise behavior. The receiver decodes the data and downloads it to a computer or smartphone, where it can be accessed by the patient or their doctor.

Proteus chief executive, Andrew Thompson, explained to Eureka Magazine, "The most important and basic thing we can monitor is the actual physical use of the medicine."

Thompson added that the system was tested on hundred of patients “in many different therapeutic areas” for various diseases, including tuberculosis,

mental health, heart failure, hypertension and diabetes.

Physicians hope that the smart pills will assist in removing one of the obstacles to medication adherence: forgetfulness.

Steve Gray, the Lloyds Pharmacy healthcare director, told Eureka Magazine, "There is a huge problem with medicines not being taken correctly. The Helius system is an exciting development which takes our current medication adherence offering to a whole new level."

Medication adherence is also known as drug compliance. It means that an individual is taking prescribed drugs as directed by a doctor, at the right times, and in the correct amounts. Patients who do not take their medication or fail to take their medications cause extra costs totaling hundreds of millions of dollars to health care systems.

Smart pills are just one of a number of solutions being developed to assist in medication adherence.

Other strategies are being tested to get individuals to take their prescribed drugs. A recent WhereIsMyDoctor.com article entitled, 'Free Drug Study Sheds Light on Poor Patient Compliance’, described two studies that addressed the issue of medication adherence.

In one study patients were given free heart attack medication and in the other, patients were given incentives if they took their medicine as prescribed. Only about half of the patients actually filled their free drug prescription in the heart attack study and the incentive program received criticism from professionals. The critics felt that patients should not be compensated or rewarded in order to get them to take medicine that was keeping them alive.

Opponents of smart pills also have concerns regarding patient privacy.

Nick Pickles of Big Brother Watch, a civil liberties group, said, "This technology has massive potential benefits for healthcare, but it should not be adopted at the expense of patient privacy. Patients taking this medication, and their families, should be aware that they are doing so and be able to see a full breakdown of what data is captured and who it is accessed by."

Gray, however, is staying focused on the benefits of the smart pills.

He stated in the Daily Mail, "Anyone taking several medications knows how easy it can be to lose track of whether or not you’ve taken the correct tablets that day. Add to that complex health issues and families caring for loved ones who may not live with them and you can appreciate the benefits of an information service that helps patients get the most from their treatments and for families to help them remain well."

To learn more about smart pill technology, find a doctor near you.

Image Courtesy of Proteus Biomedical

References:

Daily Mail. “New smart pill tells patients when the next dose is due”. Web. Jan. 17, 2012. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2087275/New-smart-pill-tells-patients-dose-due.html

WhereismyDoctor.com. “Free Drug Study Sheds Light on Poor Patient Compliance”. Web. Jan. 9, 2012. http://www.whereismydoctor.com/news/free-drug-study-sheds-light-on-poor-patient-compliance_4973

Eureka Magazine. “Sensor-enabled smart pill to revolutionise healthcare?” Web. Jan. 19, 2012. http://www.eurekamagazine.co.uk/article/39654/Sensor-enabled-smart-pill-to-revolutionise-healthcare.aspx