Dong-A ST said Monday that it would release Virreal, a new hepatitis B treatment, on Oct. 1.

Virreal is a product that changed the main ingredient of the hepatitis B treatment Viread’s tenofovir diisopropyl fumarat to tenofovir diisopropyl orotic acid. The drug received approval for domestic sales by the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) last month.

One of the leading causes of hepatitis B treatment failure was poor patient adherence as patients regularly forgot to take the medication.

To improve the compliance of hepatitis B patients, Dong-A ST 동아ST surveyed 714 hepatitis B patients and decided to include a day-of-the-week pill container and a QR code within the Virreal container. The treatment contains 30 tablets per bottle.

The day-of-the-week pill container is designed to update daily medication intakes whenever the container opens automatically. This system allows the patient to confirm whether they have taken medicine. Also, the container contains a QR code, when scanned by a smartphone automatically installs an alarm app that informs users to take the medication.

The company also plans to lower drug price compared to Viread and are working on a plan to minimize the pill size.

“Dong-A ST has strived to increase compliance with medications, which have a significant effect on treatment effects, with day-of-the-week pill container and QR codes,” said a company official. “Such additions are expected to have high therapeutic benefit to patients with hepatitis B.”

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