One way to help support medication adherence among your patients is to encourage them to opt into a pharmacy’s medication synchronization (med sync) program.
In a med sync program, a pharmacist looks at all medications a patient may take and schedules prescription refills so they can all be picked up from the pharmacy on a single day each month. This can help your patient:
- Avoid missing doses
- Cut down on calls for multiple prescription refills
- Make fewer trips to the pharmacy
- Have the chance to meet monthly with a pharmacist to discuss their medications
These programs are available through many local, regional and national pharmacies, like CVS, Walgreens and Rite Aid. Please check with your pharmacies for details about their med sync programs and how your patients can participate. You should also talk to the pharmacists to find out how their program works. It’s usually like this:
- Once a patient agrees to participate, pharmacy staff looks at the patient’s monthly medications and comes up with a plan that coordinates the refills so all can be picked up on a single day each month or even every 90 days if allowed by the patient’s health plan.
- The pharmacy staff will call the patient and confirm in advance the pickup date of the medications and discuss any changes that need to take place before prescriptions are filled.
- The pharmacy will fill each prescription and create a single package for pickup on the scheduled date.
- On the day of pickup, patients can speak with pharmacist and get their medication questions answered.
A med sync program may be most helpful to patients who are older, have transportation issues, are new to chronic drug therapy or are taking multiple, ongoing monthly medications. It’s also a great solution for patients who are not adherent with their medication regimens.
