PHILADELPHIA -- One hundred University of Pennsylvania employees and retirees with chronic health conditions will soon be eligible to participate in a program that uses an interactive pillbox as part of their health benefits.  

The Med-eMonitor System, developed by InforMedix of Rockville, Md., alerts participants when it is time to take medications, instructs them how to adhere to their care plans and provides educational information.

Penn is the first self-insured employer in the nation to offer this employee benefit to its current and former employees who have diabetes, high blood pressure and/or high cholesterol, conditions known to cause stroke, heart disease, premature death and reduced quality of life.

The Cardiovascular Disease Risk Factor Care Management Team at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania will administer the program, monitoring patient data through a secure Web site and alerting the patients and their health-care professionals to signs of poor compliance or declining health.

"This program offers a unique opportunity to blend technology with the expertise of Penn's medical professionals to improve patient outcomes significantly while reducing health care costs," said Jack Heuer, vice president for human resources at Penn, who led the initiative.

The Penn participants will be identified by InforMedix and the participants' physicians.

Both patient outcomes and cost reduction were found to have improved in a similar program that used the interactive pillbox system for people in Montana with Type II diabetes and was monitored by Penn's CDRF team.  In that study, the medication adherence rate improved to 92 percent compared to a baseline rate of 40 percent, while the levels of the blood factor HbA1c associated with diabetes were reduced 18.5 percent during a three-month period.  Research suggests that a 10 percent reduction in the level of HbA1c in a person with diabetes increases life expectancy by one year and reduces health care costs by as much as $10,800 per patient.

Past research also indicates that proper medication adherence reduces the risk of stroke by 31-51 percent and the risk of heart attacks and death by 24 percent in people with diabetes, high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol.

"In the Montana program, the CDRF team successfully monitored the patients remotely, enabling health care professionals to intervene with necessary medication or care plan changes on a daily or weekly basis, if needed," said HUP's Bonne Farberow, team leader of the CDRF team.