Factors Affecting Patient's Compliance

Therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) has been widely practiced in the clinical field. TDM requires the concentration of a drug in a steady state. In order to obtain reliable results of TDM, patients should take medicine according to physician's direction. We have studied the factors which have effect on patient's compliance by interviewing 640 patients. As a result, the average ratio of patient's compliance was about 40%. From this study 3 factors which increase patient's compliance and 4 factors which have little effect have been selected, as follows:A) Factors which increse patient's compliance: 1) Patient's recognition of the importance of medication. 2) Patient's refraining from discretion in taking. medicine. 3) Keeping exactly the frequency of daily medication.B) Factors which have little effect: 1) Frequency of daily medication. 2) Period of medication. 3) Kind of medicine. 4) Concern about the adverse effect of medicine.In addition, the ratio of patient's compliance varied with the kind of disease. For example, the ratio was high among tuberculous patients and low among hypertensive patients.