Managed Care Innovator: TJ Parker, PharmD - Part 2

Part 2

PillPack—an overarching name for the company’s revolutionary pharmacy model, pill delivery system, and mobile medication management app—was recently launched by TJ Parker, PharmD, after years of development and fine tuning. Mr Parker’s company aimed to reinvent the way patients manage their medications, which involved rebuilding pharmacy distribution as we currently know it from the ground up. The system combines mail-order pharmacy with a novel delivery/storage device that allows patients to access their daily medications in small, sealed packages that have been meticulously customized for their specific pill regimen.  

Now, after 2 years, PillPack is servicing around 4,000 patients and growing. The company’s delivery system is having a positive impact on adherence and safety, while also helping to curb misuse—a combination of successes that could make PillPack the pharmacy of the future. 

Does the device have data collection value? I can imagine scientists in Health Economics and Outcomes Research would be interested in a device that gives feedback on adherence.

Our app has a feature that allows customers to record when they took each packet. Generally speaking, though, we’re hyper focused on the customer experience and making it as simple as possible to take medications as prescribed. For that reason, our dispensers don’t have any alarms or buzzers or electronics at all. We wanted to get rid of anything that could be at all complicated or that could break.

With that in mind, PillPack seems meticulously designed. Was there a conscious effort to make the product something that blended into the patient’s home?

Many research studies over the years have shown that staying adherent to medication helps improve overall health and is beneficial for managing chronic conditions. Taking medications as prescribed, without missing days or doses, is like exercise and healthy eating—something you can do to improve your health. And yet, for most people, the environment around managing meds is just a persistent reminder of being sick. Impersonal interactions, fluorescent lighting, and clumsy pill bottles all contribute to a negative feeling around medications. It feels like being sick, not like a healthy action you take for yourself. Beyond that, medications are expensive. And time consuming! There’s no reason that process should feel so poorly designed.

Our dispenser is designed to weave medication into your life. Developing a routine is a key part of adherence, but it’s hard to develop a routine when you feel like you need to hide ugly orange pill bottles in a drawer. The dispenser is sleek, discreet, and fits cleanly into any kitchen, bathroom or nightstand so that it’s woven into your life rather than hidden in a drawer or medicine cabinet. 

This dispenser was designed with an immense amount of care and thought. After multiple design cycles, we arrived at a simple dispenser, absent of alarms or electronics, that was impossible to load incorrectly. Through many prototypes and testing, we realized there were too many things coming between people and their medications. We believe that having a delightful, beautiful way to store and dispense medications at home will help people develop and stick to a routine.

Are there any other benefits to the PillPack aside from improved adherence and misuse reduction?

Our customers find that they spend less time sorting medications, going to and from the pharmacy, and working through the complexities of insurance refills. This leaves more time to spend with family and friends, doing things they enjoy instead of struggling with medications.

Article continues on page 2

Because the PillPack does not have a traditional “pill bottle” design, did you run into any safety issue while designing the product?

No. If anything, we’ve been able to improve safety compared to counting pills and putting them in bottles. We have put in place very secure and stringent systems that have multiple pharmacist checkpoints. Each packet is photographed and image recognition software is used to make sure the medications in the packet match the medications expected. Then every single packet is reviewed by a licensed pharmacist. Through this process, we have a catalogued image of every PillPack we have ever dispensed.

Those two aspects alone, the ability to improve adherence and cut down on misuse, seem like huge wins for our current health care climate. So, do you see widespread adoption of this system? Is it the future of pharmacy?

Medications are the most frequent point of contact in health care: one out of every five adults in the United States takes three or more meds per day (according to the CDC). And, with adherence rates overall hovering around 50%, we know that traditional pharmacy is not designed to support people who take multiple medications every day.

PillPack was founded around the idea that your pharmacy can, and should, be the cornerstone for better health. We believe that if it’s easy to take medications as prescribed, people will do it. And, for folks with chronic conditions, research shows that medication adherence goes a long way towards achieving health goals. 

Is there anything else you would like to add about PillPack that may interest payers or pharmacy benefit managers?

We know that there are a lot of ways that we can work with other companies and organizations in the health care industry to make their businesses function better for customers. That’s why we’re so excited about PharmacyOS—it operationalizes our ability to work with partners in a way that other pharmacies can’t, because we have the ability to organize information and create APIs that people can plug into.