Clinical feasibility of a quick response code-based digital self-reporting of medication adherence: results in patients on ticagrelor therapy from the APOLLO-QR observational study

The APOLLO-QR (APPlying smartphOne for piLLs intake cOnfirmation by QR code reading) study assessed the congruence between a quick response (QR) code-based digital self-reporting and pill count in measuring medication adherence.

The APOLLO-QR pilot, observational study prospectively included patients owning a smartphone accepting to undergo a home-telemonitoring of ticagrelor adherence by sending feedback of each pill intake through an email generated by framing a QR code placed on the medication packaging. Ticagrelor adherence was measured at 1 and 3 months by pill count allowing to calculate accuracy of the digital self-reporting in estimating drug adherence by assessing the correspondence between the number of received feedback emails and the number of pills taken from those prescribed. Among 109 patients, 30-day adherence to ticagrelor was 98.6 ± 2.6% as measured by pill count vs. 88.9 ± 10.4% as assessed by the number of feedback emails sent by the digital self-reporting, which provided an accuracy in estimating drug adherence of 90.1 ± 10.1%. Similar results were achieved at three months among the 95 patients (87.2%) continuing the study. Only nine patients (8.3%) missed sending four consecutive feedback emails of whom three (2.8%) had voluntarily discontinued ticagrelor within 1 month. A high patient satisfaction emerged from responses to a questionnaire showing that tested telemonitoring was consistently perceived as easy, convenient, and useful, although the need for more interactivity was suggested.

The QR code-based self-reporting of pill intake showed a high accuracy in estimating medication adherence and yielded a good patient satisfaction, suggesting a potential for its clinical applicability.