Patient compliance big challenge

MINING the data of digital health records of over 15 lakh patients not only helps us to know our patients better but also provides an artificial intelligence tool to use past experiences to benefit future patients. If 25,000 patients of psoriasis have been treated and 5,000 of them had stress as a cause and they were prescribed Natrum Muriaticum and if 90 per cent of them got better with this medicine then Natrum Muriaticum will become the first choice of future prescriptions for patients who are suffering from psoriasis and stress. Using the past experiences of so many thousands of patients will ultimately benefit future patients coming into clinics.

One of the greatest challenges for all doctors today is patient compliance. Spoilt for choices through aggressive marketing, Google options, and a flood of friendly experiential advice from wellmeaning Whatsapp groups, sticking to the advice of a single doctor and following the doctor’s instructions poses a challenge.

Correct dosage

Ensuring that the patients follow correct dosage regime is another challenge. This is more so in homeopathy, as homeopathic medicines are dispensed in glass bottles with no restriction on the number of pills taken and no pill segregation. There is no way to count the number of pills consumed by the patient. As a result, patient compliance and therefore patient benefit are compromised.

To overcome this challenge, in 1982 Dr. Batra’s started blister packing of homeopathy medicines which are measured in pouches and filled by semi-automatic machines, untouched by hand. This enabled better patient compliance. A few homeopaths across the country are now dispensing blister pack medicines for their patients.

Tech for diagnoses

Another change over the years in homeopathic practice has been the use of technology for diagnoses and adjunct treatment to get quicker results for patients. Instead of having subjective symptom judgments by homeopaths, there are now measurable objective methods to judge the success of treatment.

For example, in patients suffering from breathing disorders such as asthma and COPD, at Dr. Batra’s ®, electronic pulmonary function tests are conducted in clinics which measure the breathing capacity of patients, before and after treatment.

Treatment results are therefore accepted by the scientific community and help in the acceptance of homeopathy. The homeopathic community is gradually moving towards measuring the success of treatments through objective clinical outcomes.

Latest trend

The latest trend is to use aesthetic treatment with homeopathy to get quicker results. Dr. Batra’s® has done this successfully by using homeopathic products with mesotherapy to get better results in patients suffering from hair loss and hydra facials with homeopathy to benefit patients with skin disease.

Change as they say is the only constant. This is true of homeopathy as well. Adapting to modern techniques, homeopathy keeps itself young and contemporary. With its safe and holistic method of treatment, it is poised to give a tough fight to modern medicine.