Aprexis Health Solutions, Neighborhood Health Plan, and Medmetrics Health Partners Collaborate to Provide Adherence Program

Newton, MA (PRWEB) November 10, 2009 -- Aprexis Health Solutions, Inc. a pioneer in development and implementation of programs that promote patient adherence to healthcare treatment, announced today that it is partnering with Neighborhood Health Plan, MedMetrics Health Partners, and Northeastern University to provide medication adherence support to people with hypertension. Patients targeted for enrollment in this program are members of Neighborhood Health Plan, a managed care organization which covers nearly 200,000 lives in the state of Massachusetts. MedMetrics provides pharmacy benefit support services to the patients as part of this program. Researchers at Northeastern University will collaborate with Aprexis, Neighborhood Health Plan, and MedMetrics to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the effectiveness of the intervention.

It is estimated that non-adherence to blood pressure medications is as high as 70% in many patient populations, and that such non-adherence is a major contributing factor in poor patient outcomes and unnecessary health care costs. "Given the cost and burden of sub-optimally controlled chronic diseases, we sorely need cost-effective and sustainable interventions that reduce non-adherence," said Dr. James Glauber, M.D., M.P.H. and Senior Medical Director at Neighborhood Health Plan in assessing the potential value of the program. "This study will help us to understand the potential for a proactive managed care approach to reduce non-adherence to blood pressure medication."

"As a PBM with strong academic roots and a commitment to evidence-based programming, we are delighted to participate in this partnership," said David Calabrese, R.Ph, MHP, Chief Clinical Officer with MedMetrics. "We are also hopeful that the information derived from this research will help to establish the important value a centralized, pharmacist-driven outreach program can yield in improving adherence rates for hypertension meds within a more complex and challenging patient population."

Throughout the adherence program, Aprexis Health Solution pharmacists will provide personalized coaching services to Neighborhood Health Plan members who voluntarily enroll in the study. Pharmacists will utilize motivational interviewing (MI) techniques during coaching sessions. MI, which is a key component of the Aprexis adherence services, has been proven to help improve patient adherence to medication taking.

A sophisticated technology-based system helps pharmacists assess patient adherence and identify the appropriate topics for coaching patients in each session. The system captures and stores all relevant program data, which will enable Aprexis and Northeastern researchers to evaluate the impact of the intervention on patient adherence throughout the program. Nate Rickles, Pharm.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor, will oversee program outcomes' analyses at Northeastern. In commenting on the research project from the university's vantage point, Dr. Rickles said that he "Expects results of this study to help the health care community understand the value of telephone-based adherence assessment and its use by pharmacists in patient-centered interventions to improve medication adherence."    

"We're very excited about the opportunity to work with these distinguished partners to provide adherence support to patients with hypertension," said Sean Teare, President of Aprexis. "We believe that our pharmacists will be able to employ MI techniques to help patients overcome the barriers that cause non-adherence and demonstrate the clinical benefits of the intervention program."

About Aprexis Health Solutions:
Aprexis, formerly InnovationRx, was founded in January, 2008 to address the problem of non-adherence in the health care industry. Supported by a technology-based call center, Aprexis' clinical staff provides telephonic coaching to patients using clinically-driven techniques to help patients become more adherent to physician-prescribed treatment regimens. Aprexis is a privately owned company based in Newton, MA.

About Neighborhood Health Plan:
Neighborhood Health Plan (NHP) is a licensed, not-for-profit Managed Care Organization (MCO) founded in 1986 by the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers and the Greater Boston Forum for Health Action. NHP's mission is to provide accessible health care delivery systems, which are member-focused, quality driven, and culturally responsive to member needs.

About MedMetrics Health Partners:
Founded in 2004 by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, MedMetrics Health Partners is one of the nation's first and foremost non-profit pharmacy benefits management (PBM) organizations. We bring to the marketplace full-service PBM support coupled with a highly unique combination of academically-driven, evidence-based clinical programming and a unique, 100 percent transparent, pass-through business model.

For additional information contact:
Sean Teare, President                   
Aprexis Health Solutions                   
617-886-2028
sean.teare (at) aprexis.com

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