Digital tracking medication: big promise or Big Brother?

Journal article

In late 2017, the United States FDA approved the first example of a new generation of medication – a pill with a ‘digital ingestion tracking system’ that transmits data that the pill has been taken enabling doctors (and patients) to track whether and when the patient has taken their medication. The technology offers considerable benefits by improving patient adherence to medication regimes. This paper explores a range of possible concerns raised by this new technology including privacy considerations and secondary use of collected data; use by policing and other state agencies; and conditional and coercive use. It argues that the potential for function creep and the undermining of privacy protections mean we would be wise to consider these concerns and potential regulatory controls to avoid them before they become an unwanted reality, but that existing regulatory regimes may be sufficient to protect against these problems.

Authors: Goold, I

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis
• Journal: Law, Innovation and Technology
• Volume: 11
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 203-230
• Publication date: 2019-09-12
• Acceptance date: 2019-04-15
• DOI: 10.1080/17579961.2019.1665791
• EISSN: 1757-997X
• ISSN: 1757-9961
• Language: English
• Keywords: adherence; confidentiality; tracking; secondary use of data; privacy