Professor of Medicine, Hayden Bosworth, PhD, organized a recent conference in Washington, DC, entitled, "Suboptimal Medication Use and Population Health - Intersection of Research, Implementation, and Policy." The meeting was sponsored by the PhRMA Foundation and Duke University, the Alliance Development & Government Affairs at Horizon Government Affairs, and The Medication Adherence Alliance. The conference assembled a variety of stakeholders to identify meaningful strategies to improve adherence, opportunities for future research, collaboration, and policy options. Also participating from Duke GIM were Leah Zullig, PhD, and Megan Oakes, MS.
Medication adherence is one of Bosworth's specialties and a main area of research. "The burden of medication non-adherence is one of the largest public health challenges the U.S and the world face," says Bosworth. "Despite wide awareness of the need to adopt adherence strategies, there is no clear, universal solution to improve use of medicines."
Bosworth suggests a significant barrier to identifying and disseminating practical strategies to improve medication adherence is perhaps the lack of collaboration between all stakeholders involved in patient care including providers, policy makers, purchasers, product makers, and payers.
"Such broad collaboration is necessary to identify what interventions may be effective in different populations and different care settings, and to develop effective cross-setting interventions," he says.
Read more about Dr. Bosworth in this faculty spotlight.
Follow him on Twitter @HaydenBosworth