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Research Article
Association between Knowledge and Drug Adherence in
Patients with Hypertension in Quetta, Pakistan
F Saleem1*, MA Hassali1,
AA Shafie1, AG Awad2 and S Bashir3
1Discipline
of Social and Administrative Pharmacy, School of
Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia,
11800 Minden, Penang, Malaysia; 2University
of Toronto, Humber River Regional Hospital, 2175 Keele
Street, Suite 243A, Toronto, Ontario, M6M 3Z4, Canada,
3Faculty
of Pharmacy, University of Sargodha, Punjab, Pakistan
* For correspondence:
E-mail:
azmihassali@usm.my
Tel:
:+604-6534085 Fax: +604-6570017
Received: 6 August
2010 Revised
accepted: 12 January 2011
Tropical
Journal of Pharmaceutical Research, April 2011;
10(2):
125-132
Abstract
Purpose: To evaluate the association between
patient’s knowledge of hypertension management and
medication adherence.
Methods :
A cross-sectional study was undertaken with 385
hypertensive patients who visited outpatient departments
in two public hospitals in Quetta City, Pakistan.
Besides demographic and disease-related questions, two
validated questionnaires (Hypertension Fact
Questionnaire and Drug Attitude Inventory) were used for
data collection. Descriptive statistics were to
determine the demographic and disease characteristics of
the patients while Spearman rank correlation was
employed to measure the association between knowledge
and drug adherence.
Results : Out
of 385 patients, 236 (61.3 %) of the patients had
average knowledge about hypertension while 249 (64.7 %)
were categorized as poor adherent. No patient was
considered as good adherent in the study. Correlation
coefficient between total score of knowledge and total
adherence was – 0.170 (p < 0.001), indicating an inverse
association between knowledge scores and adherence
level.
Conclusion: Although the level of knowledge was
average, patients were unsure of the benefits of
continuous medication use which resulted in
non-adherence to regimens. Educating patients about the
benefits of medications and clarifying doubts regarding
medication use should result in better control of
hypertension.
Keywords: Knowledge, Drug adherence,
Hypertension, Correlation. |
