Scientists from Queen Mary University of London have found text messaging prevents one in six patients from forgetting to take, or stopping, their prescribed medicines.
The randomised trial, published today in the journal PLOS ONE, tested whether text messaging improved the use of blood pressure and cholesterol lowering medication for the prevention of heart attacks and stroke - the most common causes of death worldwide.
Around a third of people do not take their treatment as prescribed, greatly reducing potential benefits and costing the NHS over £500m in wasted medicines and treating avoidable illness. Some patients forget to take their tablets and others stop because of uncertainty over the benefits or harms of treatment.
The INTERACT trial involved 303 patients who had been prescribed blood pressure and/or cholesterol lowering medication. Patients were divided randomly into two groups; a 'text message' group who received periodic text messages and a 'no text' group who received no text messages.
The 'text message' group received texts every day for two weeks, alternate days for two weeks and then weekly for 6 months, asking if they had taken their medication that day. Patients who had not, or did not reply, were telephoned and offered help.
In the 'no text' group, 25% of patients stopped their medication completely or took less than four fifths of their prescribed treatment, compared with only 9% in the 'text message' group.
Professor David Wald, Consultant Cardiologist and Lead Author, Queen Mary University of London, comments: "An important and overlooked problem in medicine is the failure to take prescribed medication. The results of this trial show that text message reminders help prevent this in a simple and effective way. More than just a reminder, the texts provided the link to identify patients who needed help."
David Taylor, Emeritus Professor of Pharmaceutical and Public Health Policy at UCL, commented: "The health implications of these results are considerable from both an economic and a health gain perspective. Most people now own a mobile phone and text messaging could be coupled with each relevant prescription, preventing several thousand heart attacks and strokes in the UK each year. The method is not limited to cardiovascular disease prevention and could be used for patients on treatment for other chronic diseases."
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For more information contact:
Charli Scouller
PR Manager (School of Medicine and Dentistry)
Q
ueen Mary University of London
c.scouller@qmul.ac.uk
Tel: 020 7882 7943
For interview requests please contact Charli Scouller (details above) or Professor David Wald's PA, Karyne Villeneuve, on 020 7882 6281 or k.villeneuve@qmul.ac.uk.
Notes to the editor
Full copies of the paper can be sent over upon request. Once the embargo lifts, the paper will be available at the following link: http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0114268
About Queen Mary University of London
Queen Mary University of London is among the UK's leading research-intensive higher education institutions, with five campuses in the capital: Mile End, Whitechapel, Charterhouse Square, West Smithfield and Lincoln's Inn Fields.
A member of the Russell Group, Queen Mary is also one of the largest of the colleges of the University of London, with 17,800 students - 20 per cent of whom are from more than 150 countries.
Some 4,000 staff deliver world-class degrees and research across 21 departments, within three Faculties: Science and Engineering; Humanities and Social Sciences; and the School of Medicine and Dentistry.
Queen Mary has an annual turnover of £350m, research income worth £100m, and generates employment and output worth £700m to the UK economy each year.
Unique for London universities, Queen Mary has an integrated residential campus in Mile End - a 2,000-bed award-winning Student Village overlooking the scenic Regents Canal.
Journal
PLOS ONE