CHRISTOPHER WATERHOUSE
Managing Director, IDI Pac ltd, United Kingdom

Abstract

Packaging provides one route that can connect the consumer (in this case patient) to the broader data collection world.  Through inclusion of Smart and Intelligent capability into the packaging system we are able to deliver information to developers of product that with appropriate analysis will enhance performance through better consumer/patient understanding.  In the Pharmaceutical and Healthcare sector, specifically the building of habit into the drug taking for chronic disease when the drugs themselves are not inherently ‘addictive’ can yield significant benefit through engagement and enhanced patient outcomes.  Learning from motor racing, creation of muscle memory through regular practice yields improved timings in pit stops, similarly improved packaging and drug regimen adherence can be built through collection of data and subsequent analysis, building enhancement into the delivery systems.  In this paper we will explore the benefits and industry opportunities that exist by utilising the data sets collected in use and then leveraging that analysed data to enhance performance of the drug delivery and treatment approaches.

The Pharmaceutical Industry, like many others, has the packaging system as the final contact between the business and the patient/consumer.  In recent times there has been a wider acknowledgement that by leveraging the packaging solution and adding smart or intelligent technologies that typically interact with some ‘connected’ device we can deliver great benefit and learning.  When effectively analysed, this data, when leveraged, can yield improvements in patient outcomes.

Adherence to treatment regimens is seen as an incredibly important area, indeed there is a strong argument that adherence is the largest current therapeutic area; larger even than diabetes, oncology, respiratory and others.  It is currently estimated that within the USA that the ‘cost’ attributed to the failure to accurately follow therapeutic recommendations is annually 125,000 deaths and that 10 percent of hospitalisations and costs to the healthcare industry lies somewhere between $100 and $289 billion (1). The same report suggests that between 20 ...