Future Focus

Patients who need to regularly inject themselves can often experience needle anxiety and worry that they may not be able to carry out the procedure correctly each time, which can reduce compliance. With Sidekick, Ypsomed intends to adopt a digital approach to combat this problem, through the development of a molecule specifically targeted towards patients with chronic conditions who need to self-inject therapies on a regular basis.

Gulli Arnason, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer at Sidekick, says, “A wide range of independent research shows that there is a risk of patients using their injection devices incorrectly.”

He told Pharmaphorum: “The collaboration is all about putting patients first. We will be jointly co-developing […] a clinical grade piece of software that supports patients during their injection routine [to provide] guidance, positive habit building and negative habit breaking, adherence optimisation, as well as fear and anxiety of needle reduction.”

Sidekick ’s digital therapeutics (DTx) platform is based on gamified health apps which help patients modify behaviours and adhere to therapy. It is already being used by pharma companies to support specific drug therapies in areas such as atopic dermatitis and breast cancer.

The new partnership sets up a drug therapyagnostic use for the DTx, applicable to any therapy that makes use of self-injection devices, such as Ypsomed ’s YpsoMate pen injector.

According to Arnason, in the future, Ypsomed ’s smart auto injectors “will be offered to patients pre-integrated into Sidekick DTx, enabling us to offer a fully integrated and seamless patient experience, helping patients tackle some of the most complex diseases in the world.”