
Pill dispensers have immensely helped patients that needed assistance to follow their medication plans. Primary caregivers also benefited, especially those working with the elderly.
While the traditional set achieved impressive success, the modern electronic pill dispenser is promising to play an even bigger role in healthcare. Electronic connectivity will allow it to help the patient, caregivers, and even pharmacists coordinate and monitor the patient’s medication.
Coordination with the pharmacy and medical practitioners
With the traditional dispensers, the patient had to load the medication by themselves. Since this was usually in the comfort of home without expert supervision, the patients made errors quite often.
Many electronic pill dispensers will now be loaded and programmed at the pharmacy. The patient, therefore, gets a fully loaded kit delivered at home by either the pharmacy or caregiver. This system ensures that the pills are loaded more accurately.
The patient, doctor, or caregiver can also request the pharmacist to lock the dispenser. This can be done using passwords, fingerprints, or other tools, depending on the model.
The lock prevents theft, abuse of medication, and cases of overdose. Should need be, the dispenser’s records can also be audited with more integrity.
An electronic pill dispenser will help curb medication non-adherence
Failing to take medication as prescribed could lead to medical disasters. Despite knowing this, many patients fail to follow their prescriptions as required either intentionally or by accident.
Senior patients are especially prone to such practices of non-adherence due to forgetfulness and complexity of the dosages they are required to take. This affects patients with chronic illnesses, too, because of the number of pills they have to take at different times of the day.
The electronic pill dispenser can help overcome this challenge. It can be programmed to send signals to your phone, watches, or other smart gadgets to remind you what medication and at what time. The dispenser will then proceed to administer the medication as prescribed.
Improved traditional features
The electronic dispenser is not all about introducing new features only. The dispensers are better even on the traditionally available features.
For instance, manual loading is much easier in most electronic dispensers because the system can be programmed to sort the pills and automate the schedule. All you have to do is put the pills in the separate compartments.
The capacity of electronic dispensers is also much higher. Most of them can contain and administer a month’s dosage of ten to fifteen different pills.
Conclusion
As it is, the electronic pill dispenser has proven to be a massive improvement from the manual versions. Predictions are that they will only get better, especially as the Internet of Things (IoT) takes root in average households.
This will lead to improved accuracy in administering medications, and medical practitioners will also be able to monitor the patient. The patient’s strict adherence to the medication schedule will lead to better treatment and management of illnesses.