Evaluation of hemoglobin A1c control among Medicare advantage patients not meeting non-insulin diabetes medication adherence metric

Background

Clinical pharmacists are often tasked with improving medication-related performance metrics such as medication adherence to diabetes medications (MAD). Although the primary goal in patient care is excellent clinical outcomes, it is unknown if poor diabetes disease state control correlates with nonadherence to diabetes medications per the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) MAD metric specifications. This retrospective study aimed to identify the degree of disease state control in patients identified as nonadherent to their diabetes medications among patients in value-based Medicare Advantage payer-provider reimbursement models and its impact on the clinical pharmacist.

Methods

Patients attributed to a health system-employed primary care provider group from January 1, 2022 to December 31, 2022 and identified as non-adherent (percentage of days covered [PDC] <80%) for non-insulin diabetic medications were included in the study.

Results

Of the 370 patients who met criteria for study inclusion, 256 (69%) had a controlled hemoglobin A1C of <7.5%; 305 patients also had a previous A1c available in the electronic medical record. Of those, 260 (85%) had an A1C that had improved or was unchanged between the two most recent readings. One hundred sixty (43%) patients had a reason listed for gaps within refill history including verbal dose change, adverse reaction, manufacturer-supplied medications, fills from Veteran's Affairs pharmacy, provider samples, or nondiabetes diagnosis.

Conclusion

A large percentage of patients identified as non-adherent had a high degree of disease state control suggesting an issue with the measurement of adherence rather than a true reflection of patients' adherence with prescribed drug regimens. Strategies to improve diabetes medication adherence based on PDC will likely need to look beyond disease state control.