WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., Dec. 22, 2003 (PRIMEZONE) -- ALR Technologies Inc. (OTCBB:ALRT), headquartered in the Piedmont Triad Research Park in Winston-Salem, NC, announced today that the new products and systems the company has planned for market launch mid-year 2004 meet critical needs of disease management. The new products also can complement the recently announced disease management benefits from Medicare.
"Proper disease management can have a significant impact on a person's health, quality of life and contribute to lowering the overall costs of healthcare in our society," Stan Cruitt, president of ALR Technologies, said. "Ongoing monitoring and timely intervention are very important to people who have conditions where there are serious consequences of not following doctors orders or not taking medications as prescribed. This is what our new products will provide -- the capability for ongoing monitoring of medication adherence and timely intervention when deemed necessary -- as well as the reminders to take medications and to take the correct medications at the correct time of day."
Cruitt said the recently announced changes in Medicare call for additional emphasis and benefits in disease management. "We have not had a 'health care' program in the US. Instead, we've had a 'sick care' program. It's so encouraging to see a shifting of attitudes from government healthcare officials and from many HMO management regarding the value of preventative measures that not only keep people healthy but have been proven to actually lower the overall costs of health care," he said. "Let's hope this trend continues because so much more can be done."
Cruitt said ALR Technologies' new medication reminder product, called the ALRT Med Reminder PC500, will provide the following benefits:
-- unlimited number of daily reminder events (if a person has to
take medications or other health related actions 10 different
times of the day, the ALRT Med Reminder PC500 can accommodate)
-- for each medication, selection of whether it is daily, once every
48 hours, once a week, and so on
-- a display that will show a person the actions to take at the
time of each reminder event; such as a reminder at 7 am that
may say to 'eat food first,' 'take one of the blue tablets,'
'one heart tab,' and so on. The PC500 not only reminds a
person to take action, it also tells them the precise actions
to take
-- prescription renewal reminder
-- data base of the names of medications they take
-- data base of name and phone number contacts, such as medical
clinics, doctors' offices, family members and so on.
Cruitt said that the PC500 will be smaller than palm size and will have a cost of less than $50, has a detachable pillbox and that manufacturing will begin before mid-year 2004.
People with the PC500 also will have the opportunity to upgrade to a subscription based interactive monitoring and intervention system. ALR Technologies refers to this product and service as AIRS -- the ALRT Interactive Reminder System. This system will add the following capabilities:
-- daily monitoring of a person's apparent compliance -by either a
treatment center, HMO, or remote caregiver (this allows for real-
time intervention)
-- remote reprogramming of reminder times or actions to take as well
as messaging for refills or doctor appointments
-- retention of up to one year of compliance profile data that
can be transmitted on to others for evaluation
"There are a few systems available now that provide some of the same capabilities but the product cost along with a year of monitoring service is more than $1,000," Cruitt said. "It is the software programming process for which we have applied for a patent that allows the low cost and the ease of use with our product and system. Our AIRS product and service in total for a year would cost less than $300."
Cruitt said that medication compliance products and systems have been viewed by Medicare and health insurance companies as convenience items and thus would not provide coverage for the expense. "The reality is that people are either so busy or forgetful, and that it is very easy to not take medications as prescribed," he said. "There is ample data on the prevalence of noncompliance."
"We hope that Medicare, Medicaid and health insurance providers will see that a small cost can generate significant savings, and more importantly, better health and quality of life for millions of people. The recently announced changes in Medicare are a good start," Cruitt said. "Our products have been proven to significantly improve medication adherence; a clinical trial resulted in a 97% increase in the percentage of people taking all of their prescribed medication doses and an even better improvement in the percent of people taking their medication doses at the correct time of day. Medicare and health insurance providers should be purchasing reminder products such as ALRT's and providing them to people taking medications for chronic conditions."
ALR Technologies, which specializes in health and disease management products and services, has designed and manufactured medication compliance products to meet the needs for several targeted user groups, including: medical clinics to provide to their patients, drug companies to utilize with their brands, clinical research organizations to help promote compliance in study protocols, medications for pets, eye care reminders, and health insurance companies to provide to targeted plan members based on disease state. More information on ALR Technologies and its products can be found at www.alrt.com. The new PC500 product can be viewed at www.alrt.com/PC500.
This release contains certain "forward-looking statements" relating to ALR Tech's business, and these statements reflect the current views of ALR Tech with respect to future events and are subject to certain risks, uncertainties and assumptions. When used, the words "estimate," "expect," "anticipate," "believe" and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. There are many factors that could cause the actual results, performance or achievements of ALR Tech and its products to be materially different from any future results, performances or achievements that may be expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Further management discussions of risks and uncertainties can be found in the companies' quarterly filings with the Securities Exchange Commission.