Safer virtual pillbox: assuring medication adherence to elderly patients

Abstract

In this paper, we describe a new mobile application for assisting to elderly patients and their caregivers (familiars, physicians, pharmacist) in the medication management at their homes. This mobile application will help patients to maintain medication adherence in a reliable and correctly intake of their drugs. The main target users of this application are polymedicated, polypathology and over 65 years old patients. The application was designed using User Centered Design (UCD) methods, taking always into account the characteristics of these target users, so usability and accessibility principles were applied in the design of interfaces. The design has been tested with a pre-test group of selected patients and we have confirmed that patients using this mobile application have increased their medication adherence and have reduced the frequency of adverse drug events.