May 16, 2004
Persistency: A New Take on Patient Care
Review in Ophthalmology April 2004
Non-compliance, has long been studied in medicine, and further complicates the clinician’s approach to therapy. If a prescribed therapy is not achieving the desired results, is the drug ineffective or is the patient not taking it as instructed? A newer area of research receiving increasing attention, called persistency, focuses one step upstream from compliance.Persistency measures the time that a patient fills a prescription and stays on a prescribed therapy, which is a prerequisite to compliance. Persistency gains added importance for patients with chronic conditions such as hypertension or glaucoma. It is known that a substantial percentage of such patients discontinue therapy within the first six months and that the percentage discontinuing increases over time. Some of the reasons for variable persistency among alternative therapies relate to differences in the effectiveness and tolerability of medications, cost issues and understanding of the importance of taking medication.
Posted by mehdi khanlari at May 16, 2004 08:52 PM