Smart medication management, current technologies, and future directions

Medication non-adherence is a major healthcare challenge with irreversible consequences in terms of healthcare costs and quality of care. While recent years have seen some effort in developing sensor-based technologies to detect medication adherence and provide interventions, the community lacks a comprehensive study on the clinical utility, reliability, and effectiveness of such medication intake monitoring solutions. Furthermore, many opportunities inspired machine learning algorithms have largely remained unexplored. In an effort to highlight these knowledge gaps, in this paper, we take an interdisciplinary approach to (1) review and compare existing engineering products for medication intake monitoring; (2) discuss clinical applications where such technologies have demonstrated to be effective; (3) explore research gaps and shed light on unmet needs and future research opportunities in the area of medication management from both clinical and technology development points of view. The results of this paper may open several new avenues in the area of technology-based medication.