Several methods exist to assess medication adherence including patient self-report, pill counts, physician/nurse report, pharmacy refill data, electronic monitoring, and biological assays [ 10].
Future research in this area is warranted, and it must address additional barriers to medication adherence, including regimen complexity, medication beliefs, and treatment of comorbid depression.
Thus, it is beneficial to utilize various strategies in determining medication adherence, including reviewing pharmacy refill records and conducting focused patient medication adherence interviews.
Next, the pharmacists will assess common barriers to medication adherence including poor memory, lack of diabetes knowledge, health beliefs, cost, medication burden, physical disabilities, and social barriers.
The pharmacotherapeutic analysis in the STRIP includes checks on underprescribing, overtreatment, recommended dosage adjustments, drug effectiveness, potential adverse effects, dose frequency, clinical interactions and medication adherence, including practical problems with medication use.
The relatively more modest relationships between adherence and HbA1c were expected, because glycemic control is affected by a variety of factors beyond medication adherence, including diet and exercise, degree of insulin deficiency, and adequacy of the prescribed treatment regimen.
