For those who live in rural areas or those on a strict budget, it can be difficult to get help.However, a new app is working to change that. KX News’s Christina Randall tells us how theAddMedPro app is helping keep patients and their doctors stay connected.
In a first of its kind app, created by a company called Atadas, AddMedPro helped those with addiction stay on the track of sobriety. Fighting addiction is hard enough. It takes an emotional and financial toll on families, and even those looking to keep clean face barriers when it comes to staying connected with their doctor.
“One of my issues is a lot of my patients are rural, right? We kind of live in the middle of nowhere. I have patients that come from Williston, Bismarck, Grand Forks, kind of all over to see me.” Grant Lannoye
One of the pieces for medical assistant treatment is monitoring if patients are taking their medications appropriately.
“So, one of those ways we would do that is pill counts. So, what a pill count is, is I would say to my nurse, ‘Hey, Candy, I need a pill count on John Doe.’ So, she picks up the phone, tries to contact John Doe most of the time, can’t get a hold of him, leaves a voicemail, you finally, after several phone calls, get in touch with them, and then you have to line up, say, hey, I need you to go to pharmacy XYZ so they can count your medications.” Grant Lannoye
With all those hoops to jump through, Atadas realized that the need to keep patients and physicians connected and on the same page is critical. And in such a technological world, the company decided to create an app that would do just that.
“They get a text notification on their phone. They lay their medications out on the table, they take a picture of them, and then they have to take a picture of themselves, too, or a selfie per se.So, I know it’s them, right? And then those come back into our inbox, and we review them, and we look at when they had their medications prescribed.” Grant Lannoye
The idea for this app started during the pandemic.
“There was not a really easy way to better connect with patients between visits. There’s the telemedicine and video, but physicians wanted more interaction, so it was born out of the COVID shutdown.” Bill Farr
According to Farr, AddMedPro is already making connections with doctors easier and is alreadystarting to change the lives of those living with addiction for the better.
“Did a two year pilot from 2020 to 2022, and we studied attrition or dropouts on treatment, andwe found that this app actually increased patient retention. And keeping patients in treatment is what it’s about to try to get those outcomes.” Bill Farr
According to Farr, that retention rate increased around 39%, and that’s the main goal for the app to help patients stay in treatment with medication assisted therapy, making their chances for quitting that much better.
For KX News, I’m Christina Randall.
Tomorrow, Christina is sitting down with a North Dakota family who says this app was an absolute game changer.
