More Then One-Third of Medicaid Patients Don’t Take Their Type 2 Drugs Properly

Patients on metformin, regardless of race, were 62 percent less likely to adhere to their regimen. Authors of a new study that reached this conclusion argued that the results underscore the need for state Medicaid programs to better education their beneficiaries on the optimal way to take medication.

The investigators looked at two years of patient information from the North Carolina Medicaid program. The team identified 1,527 black and 1,128 white adults with type 2, or insulin resistant, diabetes and evaluated their adherence to drug regimens with thiazolidinedione (TZD), sulfonyluriea, or metformin based on prescription refill history.

They found that white patients took their medication as prescribed 59 percent of the time and blacks did so 54 percent of the time. Patients on metformin, regardless of race, were 62 percent less likely to adhere to their regimen, but most of them eventually switched to another drug or took another drug along with metformin, the research showed.

“Many commercial insurers pay for educators to teach patients the importance of taking their medications as prescribed,” Balkrishnan said. “Medicaid needs to do the same thing. While it invests a lot of money in providing services, it does little to educate its recipients about those services and how to use them. People need to understand the importance of taking their medications.”

Journal of the National Medical Association. July 2006

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