Medication Therapy Management: Predicting the Future?

Abstract

This article discusses medication therapy management programs and how changes have evolved (or lack thereof) since their inception in 2006. In 2017, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services launched a pilot program, called the enhanced medication therapy management program, allowing specifically chosen health plans greater flexibility and enrollment options as compared to their traditional medication therapy management programs. This pilot program also incorporated a standardized coding language system with the hopes of being able to consistently evaluate the various programs and ultimately seeing a cost-savings benefit for the overall healthcare system and the patient. To date, the pilot has fallen short of this goal although another year of data is currently under review. Based on the information from the pilot program evaluation so far, it brings up a good question: what does the future of medication therapy management programs look like or what else can be done to improve outcomes and show value? A few options that could be considered include utilizing advances in technology to enhance patient engagement and/or combining other patient care programs (such as comprehensive medication management and pharmacogenomics) into existing medication therapy management programs to provide individualized patient-centered care and ultimately showing the value of such great clinical care programs led by pharmacists.