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The World Health Organization defines medication adherence
or patient compliance as "the degree to which the person’s behavior
corresponds with the agreed recommendations from a health care provider."
Medicine compliance to therapies is determinant of treatment success. Quality
healthcare outcomes depend upon patients' adherence to recommended treatment
regimens. Patient non-compliance is a serious problem which affects not only
the patient but also the health care system because the treatment nonadherence
in patients leads to substantial worsening of disease, death, and increased
health care costs. The healthcare system is integrally working with the
approach to providing quality health services to the individuals for
prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of diseases. But achieving the goal of the
healthcare system is not only the duty of healthcare professionals, it is also
the patient who is responsible for proper healthcare outcomes. The treatment
designed by the healthcare professionals is for the welfare of the patients and
society thus they should comply with treatment.
In the first place, let us enlighten ourselves on types of
noncompliance; the patient noncompliance in which the patient never started prescribed
medication is called nonfulfillment adherence. The other type is
non-persistence, in which patients decide to stop taking medicines after
starting it, without being advised by a health professional. The third type of
noncompliance is non conforming, in which medication is not considered as
prescribed, this behavior can range from skipping doses, to taking medications
at incorrect times or wrong doses, to even taking more than prescribed.
Now, coming to the patient's role in improving healthcare or
medicine practice, the patient can participate in person to improve his/her
health. Health literacy is one factor, a patient should try to understand the
disease and treatment. The treatment is for his/her betterment, in this way
patient will be able to understand the importance of treatment, making him/her
comply with treatment. It will be easy for the medicine and healthcare
professionals to treat diseases if the patients adhere to the treatment.
For instance, if a patient discontinues a medication say antibiotics,
without consulting physician, it may result in resistance; this will make the
treatment difficult for any future infections. In case of chronic diseases,
noncompliance can make conditions even worse for the physicians to treat.
Moreover, if the patient does not take medications as prescribed, i.e., at the
right time or prescribed dose it hampers the therapeutic efficacy of the
medicines. The treatment will not work as desired which will impede the quality
of the treatment. On the other hand, if the patient adheres to the treatment it
will help to maintain the quality of the treatment.So, the medical
professionals must educate the patients about the disease, treatment, and
compliance. For better patient compliance barriers to the effective use of medicines
which specifically include poor physician-patient communication, not being
convinced of the need for treatment, fear of adverse effects of the drug,
long-term drug regimens, complex regimens that require numerous medications
with varying dosing schedules, cost and access barriers should be overcome.
Thus, it is noteworthy that patient compliance will help in quality healthcare
which ultimately will boost the medical practice.
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