New Pill Developed With Microchip

Get ready to answer back to your medicine. Swiss drug makers Novartis AG plan to seek regulatory approval in Europe in the next 18 months for a tablet that contains an embedded microchip. The ingestible chip would be activated by stomach acid and send information to a small patch that patients will wear on their skin, and the patch will then transmit data to a smartphone or over the Internet to your doctor. The initial goal of the chip is to make sure patients take their medicine on time and are getting the correct dosages, but longer-term, the company is hoping that it will help track whether drugs are being used properly. The chip will be used primarily for transplant patients to avoid organ rejection.