CVS studies pharmaceutical use

Marion Davis

04/19/2010

WOONSOCKET – A new study sponsored by CVS Caremark Corp. (NYSE: CVS) has identified psychological reasons why some people don’t keep up with their prescriptions – even if they can afford them and need them to control a chronic condition.
CVS Caremark enlisted Minds at Work, a Cambridge, Massachusetts, company founded by Harvard University psychologists, to find patients who had stopped taking medications for reasons they could not fully explain, and then try to identify their “hidden motivations.”
Through hour-long interviews, the research team identified several common themes:

For 24 percent, taking the drugs interfered with personal priorities such as taking care of family members or being socially active, or just felt like one more chore.

21 percent found taking their medications made them feel like they were losing control of their lives, and sometimes felt like stopping was a way to resist authority.

17 percent felt taking medicine gave them an unfavorable identity or made them feel old.

16 percent felt they knew better than their doctors what was good for them; some believed they should take care of their health through exercise and diet.

16 percent were wary of the health care and pharmaceutical industries and did not want to become dependent on medications or suffer unknown side effects.

6 percent didn’t want to change their personal routines to take medications.

Dr. Troyen A. Brennan, executive vice president and chief medical officer of CVS Caremark, said the study is part of a broader effort to look at medication non-adherence “from every angle” and try to solve the problem.
“We are working with researchers to study claims data,” he said. “We launched a research partnership with behavioral economists and social marketing experts to understand patient behavior. This review by psychologists adds to those efforts and gives us yet another view of consumers as we work to improve pharmacy care.”
CVS Caremark is also testing new communications strategies and programs to improve medication adherence, and earlier this month, it launched a Behavior Change Research Partnership with academic leaders from Carnegie Mellon University, Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business and the University of Pennsylvania’s Medical School and Wharton School of Business to apply behavioral economics and social marketing to this issue.

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