Non-adherence to inhaled medications among adult asthmatic patients in Ethiopia: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Background: Medication non-adherence is one of a common problem in asthma management and it is the main factor for uncontrolled asthma. It can result in poor asthma control, which leads to decreased quality of life, increase hospital admission, increased health care utilization, lost productivity, and mortality. To date, there have been no studies and protocols that estimated the pooled national prevalence of non-adherence to inhaled anti-asthmatic medications in Ethiopia. Therefore, the primary purpose of this systematic review and meta-analysis is to determine the pooled national prevalence of non-adherence to inhaled medications among asthmatic patients in Ethiopia.

Methods: Different database searching engines including PubMed, Scopus, Google Scholar, Africa journal online, World Health Organization afro library, and Cochrane review were systematically searched by using keywords such as "prevalence, non-adherence to inhaled medications, inhaled corticosteroids, and asthmatic patients" and their combinations. Six published observational studies that report the prevalence of non-adherence to inhaled medications were finally selected. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis guideline was followed. Heterogeneity across the included studies was evaluated by the inconsistency index (I²). The random-effect model was fitted to estimate the pooled prevalence of non-adherence to inhale anti-asthmatic medications. All statistical analysis was done using R version 3.5.3 and R Studio version 1.2.5033 software for windows.

Results: The pooled national prevalence of non-adherence to inhaled medications among asthmatic patients was 29.95% (95% CI, 19.1, 40.8%). The result of this meta-analysis using the random-effects model revealed that there is high heterogeneity across the included studies. The result of subgroup analysis indicates that one out of three in the Oromia region and one out of five in the Amhara region asthmatic patients was non-adherent to their inhaled anti-asthmatic medications.

Conclusion: the prevalence of non-adherence to inhaled anti-asthmatic medications was high. Thus, our finding suggests that one out of four asthmatic patients were non-adherent to inhaled medications. The ministry of health, health policymakers, clinicians, and other health care providers should pay attention to strengthening the adherence levels to inhaled anti-asthmatic medications, and country-based interventions should be developed to reduce the burden of non-adherence to inhaled anti-asthmatic medications.