JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Medication adherence is critical to the effectiveness of psychopharmacologic therapy. Psychiatric disorders present special adherence considerations, notably an altered capacity for decision making and the increased street value of controlled substances. A wide range of interventions designed to improve adherence in mental health and substance use disorders have been studied; recently, many have incorporated information technology (e.g., smartphone apps, electronic pill dispensers, and telehealth). Many of the same intervention components have been used across different disorders. Further, many interventions incorporate multiple components, making it difficult to evaluate the effect of individual components in isolation.

Objective:

To conduct a systematic scoping review of the literature in order to develop a literature-driven, transdiagnostic taxonomic framework of technology-based medication adherence intervention and measurement components used in mental health and substance use disorders.

Methods:

This review was conducted based on a published protocol (PROSPERO: CRD42018067902) in accordance with the PRISMA systematic review guidelines. We searched 7 electronic databases: MEDLINE, EMBASE, PsycINFO, The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), Web of Science, Engineering Village, and ClinicalTrials.gov from January 2000 to September 2018. Two reviewers independently conducted title and abstract screens, full-text screens, and data extraction. We included all studies which evaluate populations or individuals with a mental health or substance use disorder, and which contain at least one technology-delivered component (e.g., website, smartphone app, biosensor, algorithm) designed to improve medication adherence or the measurement thereof. Given the wide variety of studied interventions, populations, and outcomes, we did not conduct a risk of bias assessment or quantitative meta-analysis. We developed a taxonomic framework for intervention classification and applied it to multi-component interventions across mental health disorders.

Results:

The initial search identified 19,280 results - following duplicate removal and two-stage screening, 128 included studies remained (Cohen’s kappa: 0.8, 0.72-0.87). Major intervention component categories include reminders, support messages, social support engagement, care team contact capabilities, data feedback, psychoeducation, adherence-based psychotherapy, remote care delivery, secure medication storage, and contingency management. Adherence measurement components include daily self-reports, remote direct visualization, fully-automated computer vision algorithms, biosensors, smart pill bottles, ingestible sensors, pill counts, and utilization measures. Intervention modalities included short message service (SMS), smartphone apps, websites, and interactive voice response (IVR). We provide graphical representations of intervention component categories and an element-wise breakdown of multicomponent interventions.

Conclusions:

Many technology-based medication adherence and monitoring interventions have been studied across psychiatric disease contexts. Interventions that are useful in one psychiatric disorder may be useful in other disorders, and further research is necessary to elucidate the specific effects of individual intervention components. Our framework is directly developed from the substance use disorder and mental health treatment literature, and allows for transdiagnostic comparisons and an organized conceptual mapping of interventions.