Patent Issued for Apparatus and method of dispensing pharmaceuticals and other medications (USPTO 11694783): Nosortmeds Inc A Minnesota Corporation

2023 JUL 20 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Williamson, David R. (Climax, MI, US), Williamson, John R. (Bloomington, MN, US), filed on March 8, 2021, was published online on July 4, 2023.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11694783 is Nosortmeds Inc A Minnesota Corporation (Bloomington, Minnesota, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “It is common that the individuals are prescribed or choose linctus medications and/or supplements for regular consumption. The complications with this linctus consumption include remembering to take the medication, tedious sorting individual dosages, following proper prescribed consumption procedures, maintaining stock of linctus products and security of stored linctus against misuse. Certain third parties such family members, nursing care givers, prescribers, pharmacists, Non-Government and Government entities and product manufactures have indicated concerns that some linctus medications and/or supplements can be misused either by inadequate attention to the directions for consumption, not remembering to take the prescribed dosage, over mediating and other errant or abusive behaviors.

“Keeping medications secure can prevent or curb drug abuse. Certain prescribed medications are commonly stolen by people visiting a home. Many times, the patient is prescribed a pain killer, or a narcotic and sent home from a hospital. The patient takes the medication as needed. Many times, the patient will stop taking such medications as soon as possible and leave the prescription in the medicine cabinet as the patient may feel they may need it again. In other instances, the patient may even forget he has the medication in the cabinet. Some people visiting homes, intentionally rifle through medicine cabinets or other areas where these medications are stored. These characters generally sell the ill-gotten prescribed medicines to others who abuse the medications. In short, security for these types of medications is a big concern.

“Compliance or getting patients to take their prescriptions is another concern. People may be prescribed to take an entire course of antibiotics. Others are placed on daily medications. In many instances, when the patient feels better, the patient will stop taking the medications. Many times to their detriment. For example, when a patient stops in the middle of the course of antibiotics rather than completing it, the patient risks getting sick again or risks not completely knocking out the bacteria that caused the problem. Some patients take daily medications to control depression or other mental disorders. If they stop the medications, depression and other harmful behavior may ensue. This is a problem. Some health insurance companies or federal programs have used compliance as a metric to measure the effectiveness of health care delivery. So, any device or method that can increase compliance is looked upon favorably by the medical community.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “This invention is a method and apparatus that provides a monitored and secured consumer assured pill, caplet, tablet, or the like. The invention is a linctus dispensary and management process. This present invention includes multiple levels of verification of the dosage being dispensed. The present invention communicates all apparatus real-time and historical operating functions to remote monitoring of service providers consisting of variety entities.

“Certain consumers find the process of sorting the week dosage a time consuming tedious arduous chore. The present invention provides the convenience of a single sort. The sort occurs in this invention at the initial, monthly, or quarterly storage cylinder section fill. Time is the basis digital function of the processors calculated with adjustability to morning, hourly, daily, and monthly dosage. Security measures included to limit access to the stored prescriptions. Dispensing of the linctus is facilitated by an acknowledgement process inputted by the consumer. This input is only authorized at the appropriate time per the prescriber’s directions.

“This present invention offers the consumer a simplified and convenient means to receive, store, dispense, and manage the pills and tablets for medications and/or supplements they consume regularly. The local processers and sub processors in this invention gather, retain, and verify specific product data. The data includes the physical characteristics used by the present invention to facilitate the storage, dispensing and consumption notification of linctus products within the device. These onboard processors provide consumers and or interested third parties with monitored and secure assured administration of proper dosage of tablet and/or pill medications and/or supplements, at the appropriate intervals with the appropriate directions for consumption displayed on the unit mounted display. This invention provides the user dispensing without the need to sort the linctus products into daily, weekly, or monthly containers. The device provides various levels of notifications and alarms to the consumer of the need to consume the medications and/or supplements and conditions of stored products, device status and history. The device annunciates these alarm functions with an audible sound, visual display, and digital communications. This invention communicates the device data relative to the storage, linctus processes of conveyance, sorting, dispensing and consumption of the linctus products. Data and alarms obtained and processed by the device logic components maybe transmitted via a virtual private network to parties of interest. The consumer is automatically provided the proper sorting by passing the retail prescription container pass the retail container scanner. The scanner provides data input into this inventions program that includes specific prescription information. The specific information may be also provided with radio, barcode, or other product identification markers. The identification data may also include the specifics of the directions to consume the prescriptions.

“The description set out herein illustrates the various embodiments of the invention and such description is not intended to be construed as limiting in any manner.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A medication dispensing system comprising: a plurality of medication dispensing apparatus comprising a housing for at housing at least one medication in bulk, the at least one medication including a plurality of doses of the at least one medication; a dispenser for separating a single dose from the at least one medication in bulk, the dispenser moving the single dose of the at least one medication from a position within the housing to a position outside the housing an optical verification sensor for verifying the at least one medication is a correct medication; a weight verification sensor for verifying the at least one medication is a correct medication; an errant dosage receptacle; a mechanism for directing the at least one medication to the errant dosage receptacle when the at least one medication is not verified as a correct medication; and an interface for receiving a prescription input which includes at least one time for when the at least one medication is dispensed, the dispenser dispensing the at least one medication in response to the at least one time from the prescription input.

“2. The medication dispensing system of claim 1 further comprising a server that is also communicative coupled to a plurality of medication dispensing apparatus.

“3. The medication dispensing system of claim 1 wherein the server is a virtual server in a cloud.

“4. The medication dispensing system of claim 2 wherein at least some of the plurality of medication dispensing apparatus are associated with a corresponding plurality of patients, the server includes a database stores data regarding dispensing medicants to the plurality of patients.

“5. The medication dispensing system of claim 2 wherein the server includes a module for producing compliance reports.

“6. The medication dispensing system of claim 2 wherein the server includes a dashboard interface for showing compliance with respect to taking medications.

“7. The medication dispensing system of claim 2 further comprising a monitor located at a nurses’ station, the monitor displaying a dashboard interface for showing compliance with respect to taking medications.

“8. The medication dispensing system of claim 2 wherein the medication dispensing apparatus further comprises a dosage sensor that compares a single dose obtained by the dispenser to a single dose as prescribed.

“9. The medication dispensing system of claim 8 wherein the dosage sensor compares information from the medication dispensing apparatus to manufacturer’s dosage information obtained from a data base in the server.

“10. The medication dispensing system of claim 8 wherein the dosage sensor compares information from the medication dispensing apparatus manufacturer’s dosage information obtained from a manufacturer’s web page.

“11. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 1 further including a timer that records a first time when a single dose is dispensed.

“12. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 11 wherein the timer records a second time when a single dose is removed from the dispenser.

“13. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 12 further comprising an alarm system that produces an alarm when the time after the first time is over a threshold time.

“14. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 12 further comprising a report generator that produces a schedule of consumption and holds the schedule of consumption in a memory.

“15. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 1 further comprising an alarm system that produces an alarm in response to attempts to remove the at least one bulk medication from a compartment within the medication dispensing system.

“16. The medication dispensing apparatus of claim 1 wherein the verification sensor includes an RFID reader, the RFID reader reading RFIDs associated with individual doses of medication.

“17. A patient care dosing system comprising: a plurality of medication dispensing apparatus comprising a housing for at housing at least one medication in bulk, the at least one medication including a plurality of doses of the at least one medication; a dispenser for separating a single dose from the at least one medication in bulk, the dispenser moving the single dose of the at least one medication from a position within the housing to a position outside the housing; an optical verification sensor for verifying the at least one medication is a correct medication; a weight verification sensor for verifying the at least one medication is a correct medication; an errant dosage receptacle; a mechanism for directing the at least one medicant to the errant dosage receptacle when the at least one medicant is not verified as a correct medication; and a circuit to allow at least one of the plurality of medication dispensing apparatus to be communicatively coupled to another of the plurality of medication dispensing apparatus; a server for storing patient information including dosing information; and a plurality of nursing station devices communicatively coupled with the server, and the plurality of medication dispensing apparatus.

“18. The patient care dosing system of claim 17 comprising a receiver for a plurality of patient assignments to a specific medication dispensing apparatus.

“19. The patient care dosing system of claim 17 comprising a dashboard display output for a plurality of patient assignments to a specific medication dispensing apparatus, the apparatus showing compliance for taking medications over a time frame.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Williamson, David R. Apparatus and method of dispensing pharmaceuticals and other medications. U.S. Patent Number 11694783, filed March 8, 2021, and published online on July 4, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11694783)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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