Richard Mawle / Industrial Design Engineering

which pill when:
packaging that aids compliance in taking medication

One consequence of a rapidly ageing population is the growing number of older people in society who must take prescribed medication on a strict regime of compliance. However, many older people find it difficult to take their pills or medicines to a regular timetable.

Older patients take three times as many drugs as the general population and their rates of non-compliance are higher - 55% compared to a 43% non-compliance rate for the general patient population. Overall, one in every two consumers of prescription-only medicines is said to be non-compliant.

A costly problem

The cost of this problem is enormous - estimated at £60 billion a year worldwide. In older patients, non-compliance accounts for 40% of all hospital admissions and contributes to 125,000 deaths a year. A quarter of nursing home admissions are due to an inability to take drugs as prescribed.

Plenty of different compliance aids exist to tell people which pill to take when. But according to Christopher Wood, innovation manager at pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline, "This is a problem that refuses to go away. The question we are asking ourselves now is how can we integrate the compliance aid into medication packaging in a way that benefits the user?"

Richard Mawle, a 2002 RCA graduate who is himself on a strict medication regime, is working closely with GlaxoSmithKline's Technology & Engineering Innovation team to investigate the problem. His brief is to explore new design thinking for drug packaging that aids the older user in medication compliance.

"It is a brief that has required me to take a holistic approach to many different packaging factors - legal, financial, physical, manufacturing, marketing, safety and so on - to develop a fresh perspective," says Mawle.

At the outset of the project, existing compliance solutions were analysed and exploratory design studies generated a range of off-pack memory aids including fridge magnets, diary and TV guide stickers and even toast logos.

Mawle put together a user group of 12 patients - young and old - taking prescribed drugs for such conditions as asthma, depression, diabetes, epilepsy and enlarged prostate. Each was given a research diary to complete, providing key insights into user needs and behaviour.

Incorporating solutions

The project then focused on creating physical pill packaging that incorporates some form of compliance aid. A trio of prototypes were designed to reflect the way the compliance problem has been 'deconstructed' into a set of tasks. The Access Pack has an access aid as an intrinsic part of the packaging that helps the physically impaired or older user to access pills inside a blister pack.

The Moving Pack, for those on medication with a mobile working life, incorporates a diary or workbook into the packaging - and has a facility to split the pack so patients do not have to carry the entire blister sheet with them at all times. The Remind Pack has branded visual memory joggers such as stickers that can be removed from the packaging and placed around the home as personal reminders.

The project will now go into a second year to extend the user research, develop more design exemplars and generate guidelines for GlaxoSmithKline in this challenging area. As Christopher Wood says: "Before we resort to expensive solutions, have all the opportunities for integral, low-tech, high value solutions been explored?"

Additional research and development by Katherine Gough, Industrial Design Engineering

more about Richard Mawle

research partner: GlaxoSmithKline

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